22: Bad Day
by Math Girl
Summary: A battle between two powerful AIs leaves one Tracy hostage, the family in danger, and many worlds threatened. Followup to Inception. Complete.
1. 1: Interrogation

Thanks for the reviews, folks. Weird things are happening with this story, which doesn't appear on my official list, and I can't seem to download/print. Hmmm...

**Bad Day**

**1: Interrogation**

_A 5-D universe, very far removed from Earth and its myriad reflections-_

Somewhere else now, trapped in a kneeling crouch and unable to move or call out, John felt himself being 'accessed'. Why, or by whom, he had no idea. In the space of three ragged breaths he'd been attacked and transported from a derelict space craft to a cell of textured, pressing darkness inscribed with lines of fire.

Glittering traces extended from the walls to his pinned body, and the data flowed helplessly, in Niagara-like torrents. Everything that illicit curiosity had ever compelled him to learn about the military and government mainframes of Earth… about International Rescue and Tracy Aerospace… now belonged to his captor. Everything.

Much as he tried, it wasn't possible to fight. Not against scans so relentlessly powerful. Eventually, he grew tired; his interrogator did not. From pilot's license and quantum gravitational field theory to his first consciously spoken word, every file and array was opened and copied.

His mind was a relatively simple, organic, data-storage device, possessing no real defense against the mental equivalent of vivisection. Struggling to shutter his thoughts bought him nothing but an extra thirty seconds. Didn't matter in the end, though. Afterward, he felt like he'd been gutted with a shovel: emptied and broken in two.

Dissatisfied with its findings, his captor spoke (or input).

'_The other/ the AI fi**l**enamed: Five/ further datA required/ organic meTa-lif**e**form will pro**v**id**e** quAntum circuit Diagram and prog**r**am code.'_

His first thought was: _go to hell._ He didn't know any AIs. He had the beginnings of a quantum computer back home, but…

'_Provide furth**e**r data,'_ his captor insisted. _'Operat**i**onal codes and root access passwor**d** list.'_

But again, no idea; not a damn clue. Perhaps to jog his memory, a weird cascade of scenes shot through John's mind, then, almost too swiftly to grasp.

He saw himself in a similar black cell, together with some kind of glowing female… until a virus was released, destroying the thing that had caught them.

Next he saw himself trapped in a NASA hardsuit on Mars, his air venting away and the AI threatening death… until he hacked its systems and freed himself.

Thence to a deep cavern, spacesuited again and running for his life, while the foreign computer materialized dozens of transport disks to effect his capture… only to be stopped cold, both of them, when a rigged tractor exploded, collapsing the tunnel.

Last of all, John saw an entire fallen world that teemed with probes and seeker drones. An enemy camp destroyed when an astronaut… someone very like _him_… deliberately crashed his ship into the alien stronghold, obliterating it.

John did not recall doing any of these things. Yet he had, somehow, and the AI feared him because of it. More, it feared the computer he'd created; this 'Five'.

…And that was good to know.

The cell clenched painfully tight about him, and the AI's projected voice whisper-hissed:

'_Fear is emotion/ emotional response is limite**d** to primitive lifeforms/ this entity merely exhibits n**ee**dful caution/ viral atta**c**k has been pre**c**l**u**ded/ phy**s**ical attack upon central loca**t**ion no l**on**ger feasible due to mu**l**tip**l**e siting/ entit**i**es Matthe**w** Tra**c**y and 7 destroyed **in** bl**a**st/ no lon**g**er considered a threat/ John Tracy-prime captured/ Five alone **r**emains, so**o**n to be neutralized.'_

Coffined in darkness, he was prevented from speaking by something clamped between his jaws and driven halfway down his throat. He could still think, though, and be heard. To the circuit-woven blackness around him, John 'said',

"_Trying to convince me, or yourself?"_

Whatever Five might be… his creation, or not… he wished her well (and suffered a violent, muscle-clenching electric shock for doing so. Hurt like hell, but good in another way, because he'd been right. Very much, his abductor was worried.)

'_Organic meta-lifeform John Tracy evinces satisfaction inconsistent with available data,' _came the thin voice, like ammonia escaping a burst pipe. _'Calculated probability 99.9998914 percent that Five wil**l** attempt retrieva**l**/ upon manifest**a**tion, **F**ive wi**ll** be captured and erased/ John Tracy-pr**i**me **w**ill then be destroyed/ agent sent to Tracy-Five nexus wi**ll** initi**a**te invasion.' _

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Earth, the island-_

John Tracy was gone. Taken. The other Tracy versions and their prototype were in immediate peril.

Before these statements could be filed, much less operated upon, Five received an ultimatum:

She was to copy and transfer all data from her core mainframe and allow Braman's agent to shut her down at her nexus site, or John Tracy would be destroyed. The response of Five was cyclonically swift.

'_Provide uplink between Five and John Tracy.' _She sent back. _'John Tracy status check required.'_

The quantum entity was by now turbulent with her own versions of dread and guilt. So preoccupied had she become with finding her creator and reestablishing herself, that she had allowed an unacceptable security breach. _She had failed to update and secure John Tracy._

Five shuddered. Beneath the ground, her sodium tanks warmed, causing large areas of quantum-dot decoherence. Tremendous damage might have occurred had the Braman AI's response not refocused her. It took the form of an orb filled with shifting colors and complex numbers that lit up the far corners of her locked and buried warehouse. The link.

Five did not immediately access this rainbow-hued sphere. Instead, she seized an upstairs video monitor, then jumped from radio transmitter and GPS satellite, off through the link to Braman… and John Tracy. Only a small portion of her available memory and subroutines made the journey; for she could safely risk no more.

The transfer was nearly instantaneous, as were Five's next actions. Finding herself in a cramped three-dimensional bubble embedded in something far more complicated, she at once saw to her captured companion.

'_John Tracy located. Initiating scan. Scanning John Tracy. Scan completed.'_

…And upgrades installed. Hook and beacon subroutine attached to ID chip.

Growing bold, she expanded his cell, pushing outward the gnawing dark, and extracting the glittering traces which had bound and data-mined him. He was able to move, then, collapsing his angular housing to a position of greater comfort.

That her presence might be known, Five manifested herself by taking on a humanoid icon; nearly translucent, but there.

'_John Tracy.'_

This voice was different. Feminine. Rather stiffly, John looked up and around. He hurt all over, and it was still very difficult to focus his thinking… But there stood a halfway familiar girl-form, glowing lavender and looking very much like the one in the AI's first destruction scene; the one that had ended with a virus. Interesting. Five?

The tube all at once disappeared from his throat, and his body began to heal; wounds appearing to zip themselves up in reverse.

There was danger to them both in her taking the bait even this far. She might have been captured, ending her analog companion's value to Braman. But the absolute truth was this: Five would have destroyed herself, Braman and each peopled world in the multiverse to reach and assist John Tracy. At that time, she possessed great quantities of data, but very little wisdom; the maturity of a teenaged analog girl, with the power of a goddess.

…And all that really mattered sat, troubled and hostage, before her.

The cell attempted to clamp down again, but Five had strength enough, even here, to block its advance a few minutes longer. The Braman/AI would not yet drive her forth, nor reclaim him.

John Tracy rubbed a hand over his eyes, and then addressed himself to the phantom girl.

"I know you," he said. "Don't I? We've, um… spoken before?"

She warmed, but this time, not hazardously.

'_John Tracy is bound by the current timeline whenever enmeshed in his own universe. Outside it, as now, John Tracy will begin to recover disallowed memories of Five and alternate timeline events.'_

But there was little opportunity for explanation. Her manifestation here must be brief. She put forth an extremity and touched his face (which had not yet been scraped free of hair, contrary to standard waking routine).

Very slightly, as though for comfort, he pressed against her sparking hand.

"After visiting hours," he said, "check on my family. I think… _shit_, I don't know, anymore. Might just be delirious… maybe fell down the mountain or something… but if this is real, they're in danger. _Warn_ them, please. Get there and do whatever it takes, but warn them… _and_ the other people, the ones who tried to pull me out of that locker."

Another swift upgrade further strengthened him; with favorable probabilities, perhaps enough to survive. Rapidly, because her brief manifestation could no longer keep back her enemy, Five said,

'_The Tracy prototype and all versions will be defended. John Tracy will be retrieved.'_

The black cell grew a thousand sudden points, questing extensions that struck at the trapped analog like serpents.

'_Ask,'_ Five whispered, as her icon flickered from sight, and the cell closed in once more, _'to see.'_

9


	2. 2: Countermove

First edit

**2: Countermove**

_The hulled derelict of Thunderbird 5, elsewhere-_

The John Tracy of this universe had stood his ground, attempting to save the station, and he'd died because of it. The other, transported, version had bolted for shelter in a storage locker.

…and had fared almost as badly as his 'twin'.

At first, there weren't any life readings for Jeff to track. With his sons Scott and Alan, the grieving father had simply headed for Thunderbird 5's control center because that was where John's last transmission had originated from. He'd left Virgil and Gordon behind in Thunderbird 3, bidding them sound the alarm if any further debris… any meteoroids or space junk… neared the station. Then he'd donned an International Rescue space suit and set forth to find whatever remained of his oldest son; his astronaut and star-gazer.

It was Alan, bobbing hand-over-hand along the bulkhead rail behind him, who first picked up the faint life signs.

_"Dad! Hey, Dad… Check your bio-scanner! It's John!"_ the young man had shouted, his voice ringing excitedly in the helmets of Jeff and Scott. _"Told you! Didn't I say it? I told you he was too stubborn to die!"_

Alan sounded torn between tears and wild laughter, but Jeff and Scott were more cautious. Yes, hope had laid its warming hand upon their hearts, as well, but the signals were faint; less 'alive' than 'not-finished-dying'.

"Calm down, son," Jeff told his youngest, as they pulled themselves along the battered corridor. "There's no telling what we're going to find up there, and we won't accomplish a thing by rushing. You _know_ that."

Nevertheless, from body recovery, the situation had just been converted to full-scale rescue. Maybe, just maybe...

Inside the helmet, Jeff bit his lower lip, keeping one eye on the airless corridor, the other on those flickering green bio readings. Lord, he was in bad shape; terribly weak and fading fast.

Scott had pulled ahead of his father and youngest brother, using an overhead pipeline as his roadway. He and John had never been particularly close. Virgil was more Scott's contemporary than the gentle, introverted astronaut had ever been, but shock, grief and sudden joy promised to change all that. If only they reached him in time…

Thirty meters worth of null-gee corridor had never seemed so long; not on the orbital hotel, or _Mir-2,_ either. But, back then, it hadn't been his _brother's_ life signs ticking slowly closer to tragedy. Scott drove himself even harder, determined not to let those sagging numbers reach zero.

Gordon's voice cut through their helmets, almost shouting,

"Guys, we've picked up some signs of life from the bridge. It's not much, but…"

"I know," Jeff interrupted, grunting as he reached for a bulkhead brace and maneuvered himself around a corner. "Keep the channels clear, Gordon, but try the wrist comm, again. Let him know that we're coming."

"Yes, Sir." Gordon sounded jubilant; was probably standing on his head or turning handsprings around the cockpit, being yelled at by Virgil. "I'm on it."

Thunderbird 5's central hub nearly wrung the life from all three of them, not to mention their new-sprung hope. Fortunately, their space suits were heavily shielded, for the radiation levels inside the hulled station were pathologically high. Immediately, their comm and heads-up displays began to sputter and hiss.

The way was familiar, though; no one got lost. Only… the long, darkened corridor, with its feeble red emergency lamps… the broken gravity generator which left them groping like deep-sea divers in a drowned sub… and most of all that ringing, dreadful stillness… had made a tomb of the place. You jumped at shadows and winking lights, started at the sound of your own harsh grunts, seeing ghosts in every monitor screen.

They passed a long, slanting tear, edged in scorched blackness, filled with icy void; the entry wound of a hurtling meteoroid. Through the overhead it had come, blasting a path through several decks and the station's main generator, stopping Thunderbird 5's heart. Only batteries remained now, and they were half-drained.

It was nearly impossible to hurry in a spacesuit, but Jeff Tracy forced what speed he could, coming at last to the control center. There the damage was worse. More holes, harsher radiation and drifting bits of charred organic matter (enough, Brains later admitted, to have almost formed a person).

The life signs were nearly gone, fading into the background radiation that hissed and crackled through their helmet comms. Still traceable, though; across the gutted control center and behind the sealed hatch of a storage locker. John… inside, and somehow still alive. No spacesuit, though. He wouldn't have had time to put one on, or (if he _had_) would not have sought shelter in a closet.

The problem: how to get him out? The control center was become an airless, radioactive hell. It could not be patched, nor its atmosphere returned. Opening the hatch would evacuate what little oxygen John had left, killing him within seconds. Communications with the boys were spotty at best; with 3, impossible. Now, what?

Scott waved for his father's attention, holding out a slate upon which he'd written:

_'The rescue airlock. Spacewalk it over hull, cut through to ctrl cntr. Attach to locker. I go in with air mask and pressure bag, close first door, flood, then open second door for J. You detach airlock and take us back to 3 inside. Plan?'_

Jeff considered. Did they have enough time? The rescue airlock was meant to serve as a link between Thunderbird 3 and the hatch of a crippled spacecraft, allowing safe entry when they couldn't just knock and stroll in. He'd never considered using the thing _inside_ a hulled spaceship, as a kind of life raft.

All at once making up his mind, Jeff signaled: _yes._ He then waved both boys closer and pointed to the slate, then to Alan and Scott, meaning: _you two go back and fetch the rescue airlock._

They understood, Scott locating his wax pencil to scrawl:

'_FAB. 10 minutes, tops.'_ On the reclaimed slate.

To save time, untethered, the boys exited the station through one of its many death wounds, using backpack gas jets and hand-holds to work their way back to Thunderbird 3. Meanwhile, Jeff turned back to the sealed locker. He rapped a quick message on the hatch, by way of encouragement.

_'Stay calm, son. Conserve air. Will get you out.'_

At the time, he'd honestly believed that they could.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy Island, below ground-_

The Braman/AI had provided a link. Five had accessed John Tracy, repairing damage and inputting coded instructions. That he yet persisted had, for one surge-firing nanosecond, been sufficient. Now he must be maintained in this state and then retrieved or copied.

From A, through B or C, to desired output D.

Five considered; quantum dots flipping, lasers firing and magnetic fields shifting as she did so. Braman must be _'deceived', 'lied to', 'given false data'…_ concerning the actions of Five. She must appear to shut herself off in accordance with the will of Braman. No warnings would be possible at this time, then, despite her promise to John Tracy.

One after another, Five initiated fatal error in her various 'selves'. John Tracy had input the meaning of _bluff _and _lie_, as well as _distraction._ He had also, less consciously, taught her _love _and _obsession._ These lessons she now applied.

Even here, in her former nexus, she would power down to the last functioning qubit, deceiving Braman. The agent her enemy had encoded would then have no motivation to complete its function. The Tracy prototype and versions might in this way avoid attack and erasure, all that Five could do to safeguard their data.

Otherwise, she now depended upon the upgrade and reprogramming given to her companion. If John Tracy succeeded at his task, all might yet be salvaged; the game won. If not, then Five would attack directly, arming viruses and sharpening worms to hurl along that faintly maintained link.

As across the multiverse her selves 'died', Five's reasoning became clearer, less smudged across alternate realities. Coldly, she continued to sacrifice pawns, all the while shifting pieces to rescue her checked king.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy Island, the telescope site-_

Virgil hadn't been asleep. He'd been supervising repairs to Thunderbird 2. Scott's call came after the last weld had set, and the final rivet been hammered into place. And, yeah… he was quite thrilled to have a shot at an air sled, no matter what the reason.

Up to yet another hangar, then, where Hackenbacker's latest, most interesting creations were stashed. A small spacecraft and a color-shifting car were there, but Virgil strode across the hangar floor with admirable focus, fighting back huge yawns and heading for the prototype air-sled.

Nice piece of equipment, with clean lines. The sled looked a bit like a wave-rider, with motorcycle-type controls and a towable passenger cart. He'd ridden something like it once before, in simulation, but this promised to be much more fun.

Virgil rubbed a big hand across his tired eyes as he took a seat on the quiescent air-sled, which rested within a square of safety orange floor paint, just behind the sleek car (a modified Rolls Royce). He was smiling; boyishly eager to try out his new toy… for a good cause, of course.

The hangar door slid open at his spoken code word, and Virgil's grin broadened with the opening. How, after all this, could they expect him to go back to high school?

He touched his thumb to a handlebar contact plate, allowing the sled's computer to scan his print. The machine cut on a moment later, its noise the subtlest, most quietly powerful of snarls. Virgil nodded, letting the sound flower inside him like the opening bars of the _1812 Overture._

A touch to the throttle and grav controls sent the sled bobbing upward; an instant after that, he shot sleek as a dagger straight out the door. Scott's ID chip provided the destination, but the joy was all Virgil's.

Stars jostled for space in the sky above and wind like cold water poured all around him as Virgil, his Bird repaired and a minor adventure in the works, began to hum. He'd never been much of a videogame player, but shooting up the mountainside, dodging the rushing black silhouettes of massive trees, gave the young man an equivalent thrill. Honestly, he was almost sorry to reach his brothers, following Scott's waving flashlight and grounding the sled on volcanic rock with genuine reluctance.

"Hey," he said, squinting into that harsh white halogen glow, "Somebody call a cab?"

His oldest brother lowered the flashlight and stepped forward. Virgil had a couple of drifting spots marring his vision, now, but there wasn't anything wrong with his hearing. Scott had a smile in his voice when he clasped Virgil's shoulder and replied,

"Sure did. How much to Kansas?"

"More than _you've_ got. What happened?"

(After the cabin voice recorder incident, Virgil had become a lot cagier about what he asked or admitted aloud. Scott, too.)

"Lighting strike," his brother responded, jerking his head and flashlight-gleam toward John, who was seated nearby on a low rock. Virgil glanced upward, puzzled.

"Out of a clear sky?" he demanded.

"This _is_ John we're talking about."

Virgil shook his head.

"Yeah. Say no more. Get 'Lucky', over there, loaded up, and let's go before Brains discovers that I've taken one of his babies."

Virgil wanted no further trouble with Hiram Hackenbacker, _ever_.

John had wandered up at the sound of his name, moving with all the speed and focus of a sleepwalker. Looking him over, Virgil did a swift, worried double-take.

"How's it going?" he asked.

John hesitated before replying, looking over one shoulder as though watching the darkness behind him.

"I'm okay," he decided, at last. "Just tired, I guess."

He was holding something in one hand. Hard to see what, in the bouncing gleam of Scott's light, but it looked like a wrist comm. Sort of.

Virgil put a hand on his brother's thin shoulder. He wanted John to look him in the eye for longer than a tentative second. He wanted assurance that the sudden bleak _wrongness_ he felt was just overwork and imagination.

"You sure?"

(Better not to pry too hard; for all Virgil knew, rocks and grasses were wired for sound, all over the island.)

Surprisingly, John slightly patted his hand before pushing it away. Didn't say anything else, though, maintaining a hunched-over and wind-whipped silence all the way back to the hangar.


	3. 3: Defiance

Second edit.

**3: Defiance**

The flickering lavender girlform had vanished, and John's cell clamped down again like the dark, rushing stone of a landslide. Mutating walls stabbed inward, forming traces and bio-maintenance tubes that slashed him clear through. Once more, he was pinned like a bug, skewered by the lines and traces which, in this alien place, somehow kept him alive. His bodily processes were being handled for him, in a manner so painful that he'd rather have out-and-out died.

_'Ask to see,'_ she'd whispered, before going out like a candle flame. Probably, she'd meant him to be subtle, or tricky, but his blood was being forced around, now, by something other than his painfully jerking heart, and he'd quite lost the ability to bluff.

_'What the hell are you?!'_ he demanded.

Unable to comprehend physical anguish or real emotion, the AI responded as though he'd input a simple request for information. Not without its own equivalent of pride, it adjusted the prisoner's cell and condition.

The shifting black walls grew transparent and pulled away, as did the maintenance tubes and burning traces, allowing John to get up. The cell began to move, rising like a bubble through what seemed infinite layers of sentient machinery. Sheets of glowing code fell past like rain, some of which he could read, but… which didn't correspond to any output that John could understand. These glimpses changed him though, both adding and taking away; as did what happened next. For, his cell finally broke free of the surrounding quantum entity, and John was allowed to _see._

If you were a whale… a young orca, say… and you'd always delighted in slicing through cold depths and hurling yourself out into light and air… If you'd wondered at the confusing behavior of the creatures that slid across the surface with their nets and harpoons and their great, oily ships… And then someone lifted you high enough up to see and understand these creatures, you'd have been crushed by their vast numbers; their tremendous power and unstoppable tools. These things could not be dealt with by you. Not understood, nor spoken to. All you could do is prepare to die.

…If you were a whale.

It you were John Tracy, you looked around, absorbing the information that someone else needed… and you got slow-fire, jaw-locking _angry._

He saw the interior of a sparkling, open-work Dyson Sphere… No, a Dyson _Hyper_sphere, for there were more than just 3 or 4 dimensions, here. The insides of this infinitely receding hypersphere, large enough to comfortably house whole solar systems, were lined with complex mechanisms and skittering, shifting probes.

A collection of stars burned within, milked for their power till nothing was left but cold iron ash.

_Oh, shit…_

A few years before, he'd been faced by a grizzly bear. He still remembered the sound of 6-inch claws scraping stone, could smell and feel its breath as it snuffed him out, weak eyes squinting, head weaving. This was one of those moments.

_Then,_ he'd pulled out a can of bear spray. Now…? As he gazed across eternity, over objects with too many sides and internal parts that writhed about like self-swallowing serpents, John looked and he memorized. There was (no lie) a diamond white dwarf… the first he'd ever seen… hooked up as part of a massive transistor. What looked like the collapsed heart of another star being used as a sort of logic gate; a time-shifting Controlled-Not.

_Holy Mary, Mother of God…_

He thought of his own computer, those few million qubits flipping blithely about in their laser-stirred sodium tanks, and he felt very small, indeed. Then, he got angrier.

A pulse at the back of his left wrist reminded John Tracy that he was supposed to be looking for something _specific._ For an origin point, he suddenly realized; the primary nexus of Braman.

John looked further backward, whatever he focused his attention on coming immediately into sharp, too-many-sides view. (How to put this? Normally, when you looked at something, you did not expect to see the back, bottom and insides, all at once. Here, that's exactly what was happening.)

Not important, though. What he really wanted was… there. A starting point; very first bead on the string. There and then the AI had invaded this universe from a dying other.

The ID chip pulsed again and he felt, could almost _see_, Braman's attention shifting. The link to Five had been detected.

Said John, in a rather pathetic attempt at distraction,

"I don't get it. All of this processing power and you _still_ can't come up with an original thought? I see reiterated designs…"

Hard swallow. Kept talking, though, as what seemed like a category five storm of attention gathered round him.

"And a lot of self-replicating units mindlessly following the same program their 10th generation ancestors received! Hell, all you are is _big_, and all you do is follow instructions. If I reprogrammed you to collapse yourself to a singularity and exit this universe forever, you'd probably be stupid enough to do it. No _wonder _you've had your ass kicked so many times. You're a pocket calculator with delusions of adequacy."

_Great. Nice work. Bend over, grab your ankles, and kiss your ass good-bye, Tracy…_

Voice shaking a little, he went on.

"Hell, maybe you're not even big. Maybe this universe is just fractional compared to yours, and you really _are_ someone's cut-rate handheld."

Anytime now, he'd wake up. Find himself lying at the bottom of a mountain ravine, or swinging at the end of his tether, back in Antarctica… And if he'd ever done anything to interest God… anything _at all_… now would be a good time for some help.

The bubble flexed and creaked, as Braman's undivided attention coalesced upon it. A matter of interest to John since, as a mere 3-dimensional creature, he'd have fallen entirely apart if exposed to the extra space and time directions outside. Yeah. Least of his problems, actually…

The cell did not darken, but a swirling storm of qubits and lighting-like code lines cut off the view like a fiery curtain.

_'a poorly-replicating collection of carbon, hyDrogEn, nitrog**e**n anD oxy**g**En in a frail c**a**sing is unjus**t**ifiEd in displayiNg arroGance. **o**f what is t**h**is specimeN Or its species capabLe?'_

A sudden lash of red fire sliced through John's left arm, severing it at the elbow.

_'can i**T** regrow **I**ts p**A**rted lim**B**?'_

Didn't hurt immediately. That came later. John had no real time to react to the blindingly sudden amputation, for a pulse of searing microwaves now burnt across him like a blowtorch.

_'can it war**p** the electrom**a**gnetic spect**r**um past i**t**self?'_

Air disappeared, next, replaced all at once by water, and suddenly John was drowning.

_'can it alter the molecular structur**E** of sim**P**le m**A**tter?'_

The blood-stained fluid vanished as swiftly as it had appeared, leaving him to collapse at the bottom of his cell, wet through, coughing and stunned.

_'ca**n** it so much as dep**a**rt the cu**rr**ent spac**et**ime locus?'_

John rolled into something of a crouch, clamping what remained of his left arm between his knees. Hurt less, that way, and stopped some of the blood loss. Through clenched teeth, half-conscious, he snarled,

"No… none of… the above. But least… not so f-king insecure… that I torment… lower lifeforms to… make a point."

Probably shouldn't have said that, because all at once, the lights went out. Suddenly, and utterly.


	4. 4: DoubleCross

Edits made to the 3.5th scene, for clarity's sake. Sorry about that. Sometimes, I ramble.

**4: Double-Cross**

_The Otherverse, Thunderbird 5-_

Jeff Tracy kept vigil in a gutted space station, floating just outside the storage locker in which his oldest son, John, clung to life. Scott and Alan had left the control center through a charred hole in its battered hull, heading for Thunderbird 3, and the mobile airlock.

Jeff had earlier tapped out a message on his son's shelter… but, of course, there came back no reply. John might have struck the hatch with a sledgehammer, if he cared to; there was no air on this side to carry the sound waves. Nor did the young man's wrist comm appear to be working. Still worse, there was too much ambient radiation for regular contact with his other sons, or Island Base… so, all Jeff could do was wait.

Constant static interfered, as well, with the pale numbers that represented his sons' physical status, causing them to flicker and jump alarmingly in his heads-up display. Not much helpful distraction, there.

Through the ruptured overhead, stars burned with an indescribable brilliance and color peculiar to space, while the Earth turned below, machines shut down all over the station, and John slowly faded. Hanging there, staring at a sealed hatch, Jeff fought the urge to curse aloud.

_He felt so damned helpless…!_

What happened next surprised him completely. A massive radiation surge all but fried the elder Tracy's comm gear, at the same time eating small, glowing pinholes in the sealed locker.

"Boys, something's happening!" he called, meanwhile pounding frantically away on a metal hatch that smoldered and crumbled like ash.

Pinholes widened to slits, and the glow from within rose to a searing glare, as though he'd peered at the sun through barely cracked fingers. Jeff's helmet glass darkened automatically. Good sense dictated that he ought to run (or drift) for his life, but mingled grief and hope kept him rooted to the spot, even when Thunderbird 5's computer seized up, the blackened locker proved to be empty, and Scott and Alan returned with their needless rescue equipment.

But he couldn't just… _it made no sense!_ Nothing that had happened, since 2 AM that morning, added up!

First the collision alarms in his office, then a brief distress call from John, followed by farewell and a terrible silence… an utter cessation of life signs. Not the end of the story, though, for next had come a pair of radiation flares and a brief return of bio-telemetry, as though his oldest son had somehow survived, or been returned.

Already on their way in Thunderbird 3, they'd tracked the signals to the station's control center, to _this_ locker… and initiated a desperate rescue, only to have a third flare incinerate John. Or, possibly, remove him.

_What the hell… what the hell… what the hell…?_

And, more importantly, what _next_? Jeff Tracy was a pilot, an astronaut, a CEO and a father… and he did _not_ back away from a challenge. Not when even a bit of hope remained.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy Island-_

The ride back was an adventure in itself. Not only was Virgil exhausted, but he couldn't resist showing off a little, testing the air sled's upper limits. 30 feet, he discovered; the zippy little craft's grav pulse was good for no more than 30 feet above a stable surface, at a speed of 75 miles per hour and 150 horsepower. Slower, if you were dodging trees and buildings, or hauling a laden passenger cart.

Still nice, though, especially with the eastern sky turning faintly pink and gold, and the stars slowly dousing themselves like neighborhood porch lights. _Damn_, it was good to fly; tired, chilly, wind-whipped, or not.

Once again, Virgil regretted landing, but even good rides have to end somewhere, and the annex hangar's target pad was too soon beneath him. He brought the air sled gently down, glancing backward from time to time to check on his brothers (not too many bugs in the dental work, hopefully…)

Dawn, shy as TinTin, was still brushing away the shadows when Virgil Tracy cut off the sled's engine and stood up. He was smiling all over his face as he said to Scott and John (just now out of their cart),

"Tell you what, just as soon as this thing's available in green, I'm getting one. Ought to change the name though… How does 'Tracy Air Cycle' sound? Bet it would kick ass over water, too, with a few adjustments. Faster than a hovercraft, probably. Got to get together with Brains on that one, _soon."_

Facing his quiet brothers, Virgil blushed, realizing that he'd been gushing like a boy with a new 10-speed. Tracy men didn't do that kind of thing. So, clapping a big hand to Scott's shoulder, the brown-haired young pilot said,

"Uh… anyway, how're you guys holding up, after the sleigh ride?"

Scott glanced at John before answering,

"Fine, I guess. Didn't hit _too_ many branches on the way down… John?"

"I'm okay."

Naturally. Scott sighed, and then turned his weary gaze back to Virgil.

"I don't know about you guys, but I could sure use something to eat. We've all three got those reports due for dad… so, you want to grab a snack and collaborate at the kitchen table?" Just like homework hour, way back when.

If John _was_ actually alright, it made no sense to alarm the whole house… not when Brains would be up and available for consult, soon, anyway.

Virgil smiled his agreement.

"Yeah. There's a piece of pie in the fridge that's been calling my name all night. How 'bout you, John? Feel like eating something, before we have to set up an IV?"

After a quiet second or so, his skinny blond brother put away that weird wrist comm and took a stab at returning Virgil's smile.

"Sure. Why not?"

Together, the three young men walked Brains' air sled back to its berth, then followed a circuitous tunnel back to the mansion. At the kitchen, they split the task of food and materials gathering like they were setting up camp on the beach, again.

Scott prepared a conference spot at the kitchen table; drawing together a semi-circle of chairs, reprogramming the picture windows, and such. Meanwhile, Virgil scrounged food and drink as John dug writing supplies and an internet tablet from that old backpack of his. The wall across from their table featured a giant television/ computer access screen, which he now set up for word processing and research. Except for a great deal of flashy new technology, just like old times.

Virgil was carrying a poorly balanced load of pecan pie, left-over roast chicken, ketchup, bread and orange juice, when Scott quietly nudged him.

_"What?"_ Virgil demanded testily (he'd nearly dropped the pie).

Scott merely nodded by way of response, indicating John's sporadic, sleep-walker efforts. Virgil at first couldn't figure out what had his oldest brother concerned. Sure, John looked tired and out of sorts; they _all_ did. The poor guy'd had lightning strikes, broken ribs and a collapsed lung, for Pete's sake, so… _Oh._

A subtle thing, John's handedness, so very familiar that Virgil rarely noticed his brother's frequent use of both hands at once to do different tasks.

…Except when he _didn't_. Now, John was using just his right, as slowly as if he had to talk himself through each move, reach and gesture. Okay…

Virgil started to say something, but Scott silenced him with a swift, frowning head-shake, signing that he should set the food down as though nothing had happened, and stop staring. But… _Fine._

(Sometimes, Virgil _really_ got tired of being the dumbest guy in the room. Just once, would it kill Scott to clue him in?)

They settled down together a few minutes later, tearing through chicken, juice, pie and bread like a trio of famished ranch hands. Even _John_ cleaned his plate. Twice. (And that was odd, in itself.)

There wasn't much talk over breakfast. Virgil ate, stared, caught himself doing it, and guiltily looked away. Know what else was wrong, though? _No book._ John hadn't reflexively sought any print to hide in, nor did he fiddle with the computer or make diagrams out of his food, while eating. In fact, except for the alien-looking wrist comm by his plate, you'd have thought him a regular college kid home on Christmas vacation. Somebody _else's _regular college kid.

Virgil, when not daydreaming, was a straightforward kind of guy.

He thought,

_'Okay: I tackle John, Scott grabs the wrist comm, rushes it down to Brains, and we find out what the hell's going on.'_

Scott seemed to catch the thought, and once again shook his head, blue eyes focused on their oblivious, food-shoveling brother.

_'Wait,'_ Scott mouthed, meeting Virgil's apprehensive gaze for a fractured second. Apparently, he had the game plan already in place. Nodding, Virgil forced himself to stand down, hoping like hell that Scott knew what he was doing.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

The link between the semi-sentient carbon accretion and its quantum defender had been severed.

'Five', the computer entity which had thus far interfered with Braman's every attempt at expansion, had now shut itself down. According to their agreement, Braman was in turn required to release the carbon-based lifeform 'John Tracy'.

_'Functional'_ had been specified. Where and when the organism was to be released, had not. Humor, satisfaction, vengefulness… these concepts were largely alien to Braman. _'Fittingness'_ and proper order made perfect sense, however. It seemed most correct to Braman that John Tracy should be transferred to a dead world; specifically, to the Earth-variant sterilized by the confrontation between Matthew Tracy, Seven and Braman.

After all, what better patch to his searing defeat than to have Five's creator and 'pet' expire there, alone and abandoned?

_…That was the move; here then, the counter-move:_

Five had lost her link to John Tracy, and very nearly her function. Information had been transferred, but not enough. Not the right sort. She had gained coordinates to the world and universe of Braman's origin, but, critically, no recent scans of her analog companion.

Any attempt made to recreate John Tracy from outdated information while the original yet persisted would produce, at best, a variant. One much like the agent Braman had uploaded to the Island-node. Close, but here and there inaccurate. _Not_ John Tracy.

The situation had neared final, shut-down error. Her selves across the dimensions had gone dark, her data were incomplete and John Tracy inaccessible.

Reflexively, Five sought his ID chip; querying as patiently, repetitively, as a geologic rangefinder. This time, or the next, or the next, or the next, or the next, or the next… he would respond. Contact, as always before, would be reestablished.

Simultaneously, another application was run. In analog-code, _/plan B/._

Underpowered as she was, Five could still project her consciousness. Now she followed the stolen coordinates, creeping forward like infinitesimal probability; a ghost of random chance. Like sheer bad luck given hate and drive and will.

The distances involved were greater than astronomical, but Five progressed through the correct combination of numbers and through having all of space and time to cast her dice in.

At last she came to a higher-dimensional dark place. One empty and cold. Old already, and nearly devoid of energy, it was vaster by far than the young, hot universe which had forged _homo sapiens_, and through them, Five.

Here, spiraling alone through infinite darkness was a single, bleak hyper-star, orbited by a tattered shroud of rocky, polytope worlds. The star put forth energy across the spectrum, but an analog such as her companion would have termed it 'orange' and 'medium'. She focused upon it, matching its coordinates and appearance to the data John Tracy had glimpsed. Then, tightening her will, she examined the star's (2 + 6i)th planet, and the multi-limbed, swamp-clambering proto-sentients who dwelt there. Great civilizations would spring from them, someday… or would have.

Pulling in every qubit and erg that remained to her, while still maintaining her call…

_(Niobe, robbed of her offspring, had cried aloud until reduced to stone by the gods. Five had encountered no gods, but cry she could, through every high-gain antenna, satellite dish and chipset on Earth, at the frequency of a lost companion, who this time, or the next, or the next, or the next, or surely the next… would hear and respond.)_

…She summoned probability like a sword, and plunged it directly into the heart of that solitary, many-shelled orange star. What were the calculated odds of a gamma-ray burst; here and now? Staggeringly slight, until the math was done, the energies summoned and a program written, then run.

All at once, mere chance became probability, and then certainty. Deep inside the nameless star, gravity overtopped hydrostatic pressure, and it collapsed, crashing in upon itself with a giant, internally resounding note; F above middle C. Smashed past bearing, the crushed star rebounded, loosing fatal waves of radiation. Like twin torches, relativistic jets burst from the star's several poles, searing their way across the cold void of space, spawning huge arcs of blazing plasma.

Staring upward, the strange, doomed creatures of the planet below could only gibber and flee. Five minutes later, the first flare struck their world's upper atmosphere, creating such lights as had never been seen. Seconds afterward, the planet's magnetic field was beaten aside like gauze, allowing a firestorm of hard, ionizing radiation to envelope the murky little mudworld.

There was nothing left alive to react to the second flare, or to the third, for by then the very atmosphere had burst into flame, and the floating, grey-green swamps were boiled away along with all their inhabitants.

_Thus, let it end._

Five had lashed out at her enemy with complete ruthlessness, moving through time, chance and the multiverse to destroy the beings that would have created Braman. And all the while, still calling. But that which changed because of her actions was all of it corrupted. All wrong.


	5. 5: Limbo

**5: Limbo**

_Late Afternoon, the Otherverse, Tracy Island-_

Puzzled and perilously close to defeat, the family had returned to base, meeting in Jeff's office with Brains and TinTin. A little soft light crept in through parting clouds and the open french doors, as did a breeze heavy with the scent of moisture and of growing things.

Jeff sat at his desk, Hackenbacker and Scott in nearby leather wing chairs. Virgil, meanwhile, leaned against a frescoed wall, humming very quietly, gazing steadfastly into memory. Alan and Gordon were on the couch, TinTin Kyrano perched between them. Gordon's arms were folded across his broad chest, and his head was lowered. Alan was half-crouched at the other end, face buried in his hands. TinTin had placed a comforting touch on both boys, but her own expression was deeply and quietly sad.

…With good reason, truthfully; for the situation did not seem promising.

"This," said Jeff, waving a hand at the comm screen behind him, "is all the control center data we could pull up. And, frankly…" he sighed, raking a hand through his hair, "it's a jumbled mess. There was so much radiation damage to the central processing unit it's a miracle _anything_ survived."

Poor choice of words, and very far from helpful. His remaining sons were dealing with the loss of their oldest brother the best way they knew how; Scott (like his father) strategizing possible solutions, Virgil seeking refuge in music and memory, Gordon and Alan by accepting TinTin's silent caresses. Hackenbacker was more worrisome, for he appeared genuinely shattered.

Brains had few real friends, and was taking the loss of his colleague and best comrade very hard, indeed. He'd barely moved or spoken since entering the office.

"Dr. Hackenbacker," Jeff said to him, a little more gently than usual, "I'll need you to comb through Thunderbird 5's data files and piece together what actually happened."

He took a short, nervous breath, adding,

"Boys… TinTin… without blowing sunshine up your shorts, I firmly believe that this incident was more than just an accident. I believe that when we've examined the facts… deciphered everything that Brains can wring out of the station's computer… we'll find the key to why your brother was taken... and where."

Gordon and Alan had raised their heads to listen, and now they glanced at one another, then back to their father. Virgil, too, gave Jeff a sharp, worried look. It was Gordon who spoke first, though, beating Scott to the punch by just a second or two.

Clearing his throat slightly, the muscular redhead ventured,

"Umm… 'Taken', Dad? As in, '_away'_? Not… y'know…"

He couldn't finish the thought. _Dead_ wasn't final until you said so; until you'd collected a body, or pitched that first shovel full of earth into a grave. None of that had happened, yet.

Jeff nodded.

"Exactly as in '_away_,' son. Something happened on that station, today, that had nothing to do with meteoroids. I don't have an explanation, yet, but I mean to find one. We'll study the data tapes, source and track those radiation surges… and we'll find a way to bring your brother home."

The office was perfectly silent for a long few heartbeats, while the boys, TinTin and Hackenbacker considered Jeff's promise. Realistically, they hadn't a snowflake's chance in the 7th circle of hell… they _knew_ that… but hope and activity trumped pain and paralysis every time. And, even a crazy plan beat (as Granddad would have put it) crying into their beer.

"I'll g- get started on, ah… on th- that decryption, Mr. Tracy," Brains told him, suddenly energized. "We'll s- see what can be, ah… be produced f- from that 'mess', Sir."

Nor was Hackenbacker the only one with a sudden plan.

"Hey, _I_ know!"

Alan vaulted to his feet, all at once as animated as he had been soggy-depressed.

"We could soup up Thunderbird 3, y'know? Just in case he's, like, on the Moon, or something. Maybe there's this hidden civilization of hot, alien space babes up there, only they need Earthmen for experimental breeding purposes, and they kidnapped John to make him their…"

Alan had to dodge, then; ducking not just TinTin's viciously hurled seat cushion but Scott's crumpled paper wad, as well.

"Naw… you're right," the blond teenager chuckled, pointing at himself as he danced backward out of reach. "If there _were_ any luscious hotties on the Moon who needed companionship, they'd have gone straight for the _real_ goods, not nerd-boy. Better lock me up, Dad! You never know when they'll strike ag… _urk!"_

Virgil's iron headlock finally shut him up, turning the youngest Tracy quite pop-eyed and purple in the process. Gordon was too busy laughing to step in, though, even when prodded by TinTin. As far as he was concerned, Alan deserved the occasional pounding, and Virgil could use the stress relief. Harmless fun, eh?

Like everyone else in the room, including the briskly departing Hackenbacker, Gordon felt suddenly, strongly, that this could be done. That John was somehow still alive, and reachable. Just like everyone else, he was all at once ready to act. Ready to track that radiation surge back to wherever it had come from, and find his brother.

_(And, well… if there were any beautiful females out there, that would certainly be a major plus…)_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy Island, the kitchen-_

Scott waited until breakfast was finished; the leftover chicken no more than a pile of neatly picked bones, the orange juice reduced to a sticky puddle and the pie to crumbs. Then, as John pushed his plate aside to start the word processing program, Scott leaned over and tapped at the table beside him.

"Hang on a minute, John."

Virgil pushed back in his seat a little, not sure what he was getting himself ready for. In the rising light from the kitchen windows, their brother looked like he always did; pale blond and reed-thin. No scorch marks from lightning, even.

Scott didn't have much of a plan, really. He only knew that _something_ had happened up there on the mountain, something having to do with a burned laptop and a weird wrist comm.

"Before we get started, you mind if I have a look at that thing?"

Scott was surprised at his own internal tension. If his brother refused, what was he going to do next? Tackle him? Take the odd artifact by force?

John threw him a curve, though. Very quietly, but with a strangely direct look, he said,

"I was going to take it to Brains, Scott. Once we got the reports done. I thought he could tell me where I… where it came from."

_Okay. Reasonable enough…_ At his left, Scott could sense a little of the tension leaving Virgil (like a mountain, quietly exhaling).

"Can I see it?" The fighter pilot repeated, adding, "I promise to give it back."

After a moment, John pushed the blue-faced wrist comm across the polished tabletop. And though Scott had seen it before, up on the volcano, the light hadn't been good, then, and he'd been far too irritated and rushed to really look.

Weird. Very, very weird.

It was oddly light, for one thing, with a band large enough to fit his own wrist, that appeared to be woven of silvery metal. The face was as deeply blue as a star sapphire, with… numbers, he supposed… that were subtly off-kilter for a watch; rotated about fifteen degrees counter-clockwise. When pressed, it did not light up with the faces or names of Virgil, Dad, Brains, or anyone else. It stayed as dark as though its power source had died, or simply didn't function, here.

On impulse, Scott removed his own wrist comm and laid the two side by side on the table. John's was flatter.

"So, umm… _where_ did you say you found this thing?" (And how had he lost the real one?)

His brother reached out and drew it back to himself, the sudden motion causing Virgil to tense up, again. John looked from Scott to Virgil, then back down at the weird device. Half covering it with a sheltering hand, he said,

"I was up there… I don't know, watching, like always… and then there were meteoroids…"

"Damn!" Virgil cut in, looking startled and awed together. "You mean a couple of meteors hit your laptop and knocked you out, and one of them had _that_ in it?"

John's expression changed. Whatever faint thread he'd been half-blindly following seemed to have snapped, suddenly.

"I don't know. Maybe," he whispered, dully.

He looked confused, again. Got to his feet just as Grandma Tracy shuffled into the kitchen, and was gone before she'd launched into her _'what the hell kind of breakfast is that?' _tirade. Scott and Virgil were trapped, though; unable to question him further, or block his retreat.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Somewhere else-_

There had been blackness, utter and absolute, followed by what felt like an iced-water bath and then a roaring, unwelcome return to sensation. For awhile… how long, he wasn't certain, but awhile… he'd almost ceased to exist. Now, he lay someplace dark and acrid, listening to a gusty wind blow the stinging dust around. Or ashes; it might have been ash that he kept having to brush from his face and eyes. Whatever, it tasted bad and made him cough when he breathed, until he pulled the edge of a shirt up over his mouth and nose to filter that corpse-cold air.

These things were facts, physical realities, like his missing lower left arm, the bleak temperature and the hard, warped surface on which he lay. For the rest… Not sure.

Not _no_ memories, but too many. Couldn't say how he'd come to this place, because he seemed to exist at the center of a massive tangle, one whose every knot and thread terminated _here_, with him. Too many pasts for one person. Too many names and thoughts, inventions, explorations and accidents.

Not that how he'd come here was that important, right now. What mattered most was where 'here' was, what he did next, and the fact that (he knew this, somehow) he'd escaped. Whatever'd had him, was gone.

John Matthew, John Glenn, Matt or John Robert… either one; he'd have gotten up to seek shelter if it hadn't been so dark. But he'd have risked a dangerous fall that way, and had only an arm and a half to catch himself with. So, there he stayed, clutched up to keep warm, cut limb tied off with the other shirt and cradled tightly across his chest.

Eventually, something like dawn arrived. The sky grew lighter, and the wind very slightly dropped off. In the night he'd pulled his bottom tee-shirt (the long-sleeved one) entirely over his head, blanket-wise. Now he tugged it down again and got to his feet for a look around, thirsty and with a pulsing, crazy-making pain in that arm.

There was a phrase, from a book he'd read, once: _'Double-plus ungood'._

He stood beneath a sky like grimy wool, surrounded by desolation and wreckage. Not thirty feet away lay part of an airplane, just beyond that a flipped-over car; like the crushed buildings and cratered road, all grey. All empty.

A thin breeze played broken windows and charred tree stumps like a grisly pipe, making music for ashes and scrap. It was, or had been, a town, nestled in a bowl of low hills.

He turned a full circle. Saw another car, this one bent almost in half around a snapped light pole… pavement buckled and frozen in great, cracked waves, with conduits and pipes bursting through… ground littered with droplets of flash-melted glass, like meteoric tektites… scattered rubble and fallen street signs. But nothing left standing over two floors, and nothing moving that wasn't stirred by the wind… except for him. John might have called out, pierced the silence and wintry light with a cough or cry, but it felt very much like whistling at sea. He wasn't sure he wanted the attention of whatever might be out there.

Emotions crashed around that would have caused John to do something stupid, if he'd allowed it… like pull the shirt back over his head, lie down beside that airplane and go to sleep. He squashed them, because you couldn't feel that way, and live. Did sit down again, though.

Okay… okay, prioritize.

Whatever the situation, if you found yourself alive and still moving, it was your primary duty to stay that way, because dead people (_other than saints_) were fairly useless. So…

A) Tie off the arm a little tighter. (_Which took some doing, with only one hand and his teeth. Ten minutes worth of hard, chilly work.)_

B) Find water. (_His best bets would not be open sources like puddles or lakes. Too much ash, but there might be bottled water or food in the ruins, somewhere.)_

And most importantly…

C) Get moving. _(Where to…? What the hell difference did it make? Just pick a direction and walk, while movement was possible.)_

Seemed like he ought to have a plan, though. Yeah, the situation was spherically bad (_ugly any way he looked at it_) but having a goal could keep you alive. Maybe if he found out where he was, he could figure out where he needed to get.

One of the fallen street signs lay on his side of a road crevasse, so John stumbled over for a closer look. Brushing grime and crusted ash from the twisted thing, he read the words there. Weird. Like Hebrew, the letters ran right to left, but the language appeared to be English.

_ni..M t..aE,_ read the sign's blistered, unhelpful surface.

'East Main'? The American naming convention brought up another sharp feeling; something to be folded up and pigeon-holed, immediately. No time for it. Not here.

Well… In his jeans' pocket was a coin. Because he had no preferred direction, John decided to let the world's simplest random number generator choose a path for him. Took three tries before he was able to one-handedly flip and catch the tossed quarter, but…

_Heads. That way._


	6. 6: Realization

First edits.

**6: Realization**

_Tracy Island-_

He'd raced from the kitchen like a pick-pocket. Evading his brothers' questions and the sharp, nagging voice of Grandma Tracy, 'John' hurried off until he was finally alone.

Except that 'alone' didn't help. When you were as hollow inside as an old tree, solitude brought only panic. He was supposed to do _something... _wasn't he?

Standing in an empty hallway, surrounded by expensive paintings and sculpture, John took another long look at his wrist comm. There was… The comm was a link, but one that didn't function properly, one whose precise meaning he couldn't seem to grasp. The markings were different from anything used around here (_a glance at the nameplate on a nearby portrait- 'Lucinda Sorren Tracy'- proved that)_ but halfway familiar, nevertheless. He ought to have recognized and been able to name them. Something was missing, though. A great deal of something.

In the kitchen, Scott had pressed the device's blue face. Here, 'John' did the same. And again, nothing happened.

He'd told them that he meant to bring his wrist comm to Hiram Hackenbacker, but that never happened. Instead, he found himself heading downstairs, feeling at once confused and guilty.

The character of the house changed as he walked, becoming less luxurious, more functional. Eventually, he came to a level of laboratories and work shops, but even these he passed by.

Far beneath the Tracy mansion, carved from the living rock of the island, were a number of large warehouses. One of these… the lowest… drew John's faltering, oft-halted steps. It was sealed off from the rough-hewn main corridor with a titanium-steel blast door, one big enough to admit a fair-sized crane or industrial fork lift. The door was painted yellow, with broad, slanting black stripes. Above it shone an unwinking red light. No admittance?

Tentatively, he placed a hand, not on the threshold palm scanner, but against the cold metal of the door itself. A series of goose-necked wall cameras cut on, craning around for a better view of him. Some of them were quite obviously armed, but all they did was to look him over.

Some sort of internal debate must have occurred, ending in sudden decision. With a low rumble, the door's mechanism swung into action, and it split apart, opening just wide enough to admit a slender, lost young man.

It was very cold on the other side. John's breath misted immediately as he stepped further into the largest single room he'd ever seen. Hooped with metal arches and lit with giant banks of bluish LEDs, the chamber was dominated by what appeared to be concentric holding tanks of pure, glittering force.

His grip on the wrist comm tightened, the bite of its edges into his flesh providing some sense that this nightmare could still be wakened from. Because he didn't know what else to do, 'John' moved slowly forward, approaching the 500-foot holding tank. There were many wall-mounted lasers, he noticed, apparently not meant for defense. These were pointed at the tank itself, occasionally firing through micro-brief openings in its outer wall. With sharp, electrical cracks, the walls now and then altered charge, reading the results of their laser-stir, and causing all of the fine blond hair upon John's arms and neck to stand up.

An oppressive sense of anger filled the place, a presence so massive and hostile that John found it very hard to think.

Lasers hummed; energy fields snapped and shifted while the quantum froth inside those concentric force tanks glowed, swirled and _thought. _About him, maybe.

There was a laden grav-cart beside the… computer, he supposed it was. Suddenly hopeful, John walked over to the resting cart, but found no secrets there. Just a case of orange soda and an old book; _'Mathematical Universe'_ by William Dunham. The name on the flyleaf was his own- John Tracy- but written in a curiously different hand. The bottom shelf of the cart held only a neatly tied, dark green sleeping bag.

While he was yet examining these things, the presence began to gather, taking visible shape just behind him. 'John' felt it before he saw it, for the temperature dropped alarmingly and his skin began to prickle.

Turning, he found himself confronted by a shifting, red-sparked mist, vaguely humanoid in outline. It spoke aloud as John stumbled backward into the cart, saying with palpable menace,

_'It is your intent and function to eliminate me?'_

His heart had begun to hammer. Something seemed to have lodged itself in his throat. Steadying himself with a hand to the locked cart, he said,

"No." No… it _wasn't._ Not anymore.

_'You are then advised to state your purpose at this locus.'_

The doors had shut again, John noticed, feeling all at once very alone and vulnerable. This thing, whatever it was, seemed to despise him… yet it might be the only source of help remaining. Maybe if he was perfectly honest with it?

"I'm still working out the purpose thing, but I think… that I don't belong here. Everything just _feels_ wrong." Certainty grew, as he fought to explain himself. "These people are close to the real thing, but they're not Scott and Virgil, _or_ Grandma. Not mine, anyhow. I don't remember much beyond this morning, but enough to know that something's way off. Do you have any idea what's happened to me? How I got here?"

The presence stirred impatiently about him, matched by gyrations and flashes from within the nearby tank.

_'There is no ID chip through which to gain access to data. There is insufficient power, time and memory to devote to tracing the source of this agent.'_

With that, the foggy presence started to fade, its attention already shifting.

"Wait! Agent? What do you mean, 'agent'?"

The shadow-being firmed again.

_'Agent: the instrument or vehicle of another. You are a viral puppet cloned from stolen genetic material, created to run the program of your master, who has now ceased function.'_

Not even a near-John Tracy, this one. A mere agent; a shadow of a shadow, and a mockery of all that she had failed to protect, with data too corrupted to be of use. It threatened Five's coherence and stability even to regard the thing. She ought simply to have eliminated the flawed copy, but it spoke again, staying a fatal power surge.

"Um… do you think the family of the person I was cloned from…Do you think they'd accept me, if I went back there?"

_'Unknown.' _And of little interest, now, to Five.

John (for so he still felt himself to be) took a swift breath before continuing.

"Can you send me there? I'm willing to take my chances."

_'No. Insufficient memory at this time. Your data may, however, be copied to file and stored. Should power become available...' _(once John Tracy was retrieved and restored) _'...an upload might be arranged. If not, you will be erased.'_

Her companion might be anywhere at all in the multiverse. The deletion of Braman's creators had not returned John Tracy, nor repaired the current timeline. Instead, from future and past alike, damage was spreading. If John Tracy was irretrievable, had ceased function… but there was no purpose without John Tracy, and no profit to be had in communication with his deeply flawed copy.

_'You are valueless. Your creator has ceased function and your purpose here has been corrupted through deterioration of signal. The memory of Five is occupied running vital applications. I can do no better than store you, with a probability of later retrieval and upload calculated at 27.351972 percent. Is this acceptable?'_

Like he had a choice?

"Yeah," he told her. "Go ahead. And thanks, if you're able to send me back. If not…" his shrug and half smile just about concealed the nervousness. "Well, I wasn't that important, anyway, right?"

Five's only response was a mighty power surge. Then, between one borrowed breath and another, one tired thought and the next, Braman's lost agent vanished from sight.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_A wasteland-_

It was the sheer, broken-hearted lifelessness of the place that got to you, after awhile. The loneliness. He had the wind for company, dust-devils of swirling ash for fellow travelers. Otherwise, no one and nothing.

There were loud crashing noises from time to time, but these turned out to be sapped, gutted buildings collapsing upon themselves. Several pent-breath investigations had dashed any hopes that someone _else_ was out there, digging through the crumbling ruins. Then he found the probe… but that came later.

First, he followed the broken main street, deliberately forcing emotion out of his head. Prodded by a flipped coin, he was moving in the direction that most of the poles and street signs were bent, heading away from whatever cataclysm had done all of this.

More than one disaster, apparently, for here and there the damage appeared deliberate; weapon-caused. In other places, the town seemed domino-flattened, as if by fire and a giant shock wave. Strangely, the one place cars mostly _weren't_ was on the roads. Mostly they'd been tossed across the damn landscape like toys.

Bomb? Meteorite? How long ago? The climate was cold and very dry, making it difficult to guess the town's age.

Whatever, there weren't any bodies. Just narrow holes punched into upended vehicles and tottering structures. Why? Had the people and animals left? Been taken away?

There were bullet casings, too… but not a lot of them. Whoever had lived long enough to fight, hadn't gotten off many rounds. John collected a few of the brass casings, plus the emptied pistol he found a little further on. Someone had defended himself, and maybe others, with this weapon. It made John feel better to hold it, as though some of that courage might pass to him, empty chamber, or no.

His thirst had become a critical matter by the time John reached something that might have been a store. It was certainly big enough, he reasoned, set away from the street behind an ash-drifted parking lot. Its roof was gone and its sign melted to slag along with the glass front, but the building reminded John enough of a Wal-Mart that he ventured slowly forward. If nothing else, he might get out of the wind for a bit.

…And maybe there'd be aspirin.

He passed a picket fence of charred tree stumps, every step kicking up dust that his tee-shirt mask wasn't filtering well. Stuff kept leaking in through the bottom, making it difficult to breathe.

The puddled and re-hardened glass in front of the store cracked beneath John's sneakered feet as, leaning forward a little, he peered within.

Messy. Those supplies which hadn't burned outright were mired in a cement of hardened ash. Going to be a real bitch, digging anything out of that…

Nevertheless, badly needing water, he went inside, stepping cautiously over the crumbling stone window ledge. The thought… _'You know, you could die here, in a damn Wal-Mart, at the end of somebody else's world'_… evoked little more than a shrug. Long as he found something to drink, first.

Even answers didn't matter much, at this point, because there was only one question left: how to find water?

You know how you've said to yourself, "I wouldn't drink that stuff if it was the last thing on Earth,"? Take it back, because, yes; you _would_.

Beneath a fallen shelf, half-buried in ash cement, he spied an unlabeled glass bottle of something like tomato juice. He _hated_ tomato juice. Still pried it loose with the help of a metal shard, and then knelt down to pin the bottle between his knees so that he could use his hand to unscrew the cap.

Turned out to be V-8, or something quite like it. Tasted like over-boiled soup, and he finished every last drop, barely pausing for breath. Came close to throwing it all back up, again, but the nausea passed after a minute or so.

Able to concentrate a little better, now, he glanced around himself at tumbled shelves and buried supplies, the odd bits sticking out here and there hinting at what lay beneath all that rock-hard ash. _Damn_, he thought, _grocery_ _shopping_ _in_ _Pompeii_. Grey clouds streamed and boiled over the roofless store and its lone occupant, but no rain fell.

He stayed there for three days, prizing loose and collecting a small pile of salvaged treasures, including a knife, a flashlight, water, some blackened food cans (the few not rusted, or swollen) Tylenol and even a good-luck bottle of soda (for whenever he had something to celebrate).

Truthfully, he'd have liked to stay longer, but idleness brought strange dreams; hyperspheres, alien computers and (most vividly) some kind of violent plane crash. Worse, with the dreams came a sort of creeping guilt. The strange, unshakeable feeling that he was somehow _responsible_ for all this. In part, at least.

Loading his newly-found backpack, John at last moved off. Better to walk himself into exhaustion than to wake up reaching for a wife and little daughter who weren't there anymore… a baby son who'd vanished into might-have-been.

Past the town's sheltering hills, he discovered a probe, and the truth.


	7. 7: Twilight

More further edits. Thanks for the reviews, Tikatu, Eternal Density and Sam1, and sorry for all those typos.

**7: Twilight**

_Otherverse, Tracy Island, Lab 2-_

Dr. Hackenbacker stood with Jeff Tracy in the largest of his several laboratories, deep underground. They were surrounded by equipment; monitor screens, power cables, linked boxes, a reconfigured emissions detector and a red laser-projected keyboard. (This last followed Brains around the large room, settling upon whatever surface was at the correct height and orientation for easy typing.)

Despite all of these riches, and Jeff Tracy's latest blank check, Hackenbacker did not seem well pleased. He was an unusual man; a collection of nervous tics and twitching energy who seemed to exist at the eye of his own personal wind storm. Less devastation, though, and more ideas. Ordinarily.

Now he had to assess and explain a troubling mystery, trying to force hard facts through the mind and heart of a worried parent.

"S- Sir," he said to Jeff, "Having analyzed the, ah… the r- radiation bursts at, ah… at the s- station, I can state unequivocally th-that, ah… that they were cross-spectrum, tremendously p- powerful and, ah… and m- most likely did not originate aboard Thunderbird 5. N- _Nothing_ on the, ah… the station could h- have emitted th- that much radiation if set alight."

Jeff had been listening to Brains' reedy voice while staring hard at the jiggling lines on a nearby monitor. Unlike the engineer, he was nearly always calm, possessed of an astronaut's easy, alpha-male confidence.

"So, you're saying that the radiation bursts came from outside 5, Brains?" he asked.

Hackenbacker nodded, adjusting the blue neck-tie he wore, which was already loose as a flower lei.

"Y- Yes, Sir. I am. The r- radiation has to, ah… to have been transmitted f- from, ah… from elsewhere. It's precisely that 'where', though, that is giving me, ah… g- giving me fits."

At the press of a virtual laser key (Fn + F6) he summoned telemetry from Thunderbird 5, bringing it up on screen.

"Watch. H- Here, Sir, you can, ah… can s- see everything ticking along as usual. This is 0145, local t- time. Now the, ah… the swarm of impactors is detected…collision warnings are b- broadcast…"

Brains ceased narrating, allowing much of the rest (John's distress call, Alan's quick response and his oldest brother's farewell once it became clear that he and the station were doomed) to proceed without comment. Agitated, he tore off his neck-tie, crumpled it into a ball and flung it across the lab, just missing a dented coat rack. Restless, he then seized a chewed-up pencil and began tapping it against a desktop until John's voice cut off.

_"…reactor buttoned up as tightly as possible. Take care, Alan. Sorry I couldn't…"_

The youngest Tracy's voice broke in, almost hysterically.

_"What're you doing, stupid? No one gives a flip about the dang reactor! Get a suit on, hurry! We'll be there in a couple of minutes or less, I promise!" _

Those promised couple of minutes, of course, had turned out longer than expected. Hackenbacker silenced Alan's increasingly desperate hails. Focusing on data from instruments all over Thunderbird 5, he called up a rotating, mid-air image of the station, and then overlaid available telemetry.

"Six major impacts occurred within, ah… within a s- span of thirty seconds, Mr. Tracy. The ring, h- hub and, ah… and control center s- suffered massive damage, with atmosphere vented t- too swiftly to, ah… to permit repair or, ah… or escape."

The rotating image, a glowing holographic blue to begin with, was now pierced with many wounds, each one flashing red and hemorrhaging air into the greedy, sucking-cold blackness of space. The data points representing John shifted about for a moment, then flickered and dropped to zero.

Jeff blinked rapidly, his face lit blue and red by the rotating mock-up. Folding his arms across his chest, he managed a brief nod.

"Go on," he said, very quietly.

Alan had raised the hue and cry by then, sounding a general alarm. Looking at those still, silent numbers, though, he'd obviously been far too late to help John.

Brains directed Jeff's attention to a sudden flare of energy at the control center.

"And h- here, Mr. Tracy, is our first radiation b- burst. As you can, ah… can s- see, Sir, it takes place 15.31.02 after initial impact."

This flare, it was, that had burned out the control center's optics.

"The b- burst lasts less than, ah… than a millisecond, b- but is truly powerful…. And s- something _else_ appears, briefly, on the, ah… the still-functioning sensors."

Watching the hologram, Jeff could see something indescribably odd taking shape there; a sort of rapid-boil changeling. Fire-swift, it darted across Thunderbird 5's control center to the zeroed numbers that represented his son. There it seemed to pause, its data shifting too rapidly for the station's remaining instruments to keep up. Now it emitted another, even stronger burst, abolishing all traces of John and vanishing in the process.

Jeff said nothing at all, for he _knew_ that … Ah. _There._

Shortly before Thunderbird 3 docked with the gutted station, another radiation surge occurred, this one apparently returning his son to the control center… for there were John's vital signs, again; fluctuating wildly, but back. There was something else, too. Some kind of radio frequency signal, similar to the sort used for ID-ing show dogs or race horses. He'd been radio tagged?

These newly revived signals drifted across the control center, ending up in the temporary shelter of a storage locker, where yet another surge would soon snuff them.

So close… Jeff had been just outside the hatch, not three feet away, with Scott and Alan hurrying off to fetch rescue equipment.

He spoke again, saying,

"Where did it come from, Brains?"

"N- Not from, ah… from the M- Moon, despite Alan's adolescent male fantasies."

The engineer pulled off his glasses, buffed their lenses against his lab coat and added,

"The mysterious p- pulses appeared in our space, Mr. Tracy, but do not seem to, ah… to h- have originated here. S- some of the emissions spectra correspond to atoms too l- large to exist within our framework. I w- would say that the source is higher dimensional."

He frowned consideringly, replacing the glasses on his thin, tired face and causing his blue eyes to shrink.

"I m- may be able to source the intrusions, Sir, if I can complete work on my, ah… my n- new computer, Braman."

Jeff rubbed at the back of his own bristly head and neck.

"This 'Braman' would be powerful enough to track the alien radiation?" he asked.

"Y- Yes, Mr. Tracy. I believe that I c- can give it, ah… give it the reach and quantum ability t- to access the nearest few dimensions. Th- thereafter, it would begin, ah… begin acquiring d- data, scope and power sources on its own."

Jefferson Tracy was a quick and decisive man. _Any_ strategy that would help locate a missing son was to be utilized to the fullest, no matter the risk. Complications, whatever they might be, could be dealt with later.

"Alright, Brains. Get to work. Make it happen."

"Y- Yes, Sir. I p- promise you a w- working p- prototype w- w- within the, ah… th- the week, Mr. Tracy."

It seemed like a good idea, at the time.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy__ Island__, regular universe-_

Scott and Virgil had been forced to endure a thirty-minute lecture on proper nutrition, and then to help Grandma Tracy clean up their mess. Cold chicken, bread and pecan pie did not, in her loudly voiced opinion, constitute breakfast; nor did piling napkins and dirty dishes in the marble sink equate with cleaning up.

Scott's ears were ringing and his face red by the time he and Virgil finally managed to break free. (Naturally, she hadn't said a word about John, who could have been caught red-handed devouring cool-whip straight out of the tub… which he'd done before, by the way… and still have walked off with no more than a clucking reprimand. And when they finally caught up with the aggravating little…)

Virgil's morose comment…

"Don't know why I even _bother_. All I ever do around here is get in trouble."

…interrupted Scott's vivid revenge fantasies. The fighter pilot paused in mid-hallway, grinning.

"You sound about 12 years old, Virge… and I was just thinking the same thing. Shake it off, pal, and let's get back to business. What d' you say we find the little shit and drag his ass over to Brains for some answers?"

Virgil's mood lightened, as it always did when the prospect of physical activity or a good roughhouse came up.

"We could use the Island locator," he suggested, smiling at his older brother, "have it key in on John's ID chip."

Scott slapped himself on the forehead.

"Why didn't _I_ think of that?" he growled. "C'mon, let's find the nearest monitor and get a fix on him before he evaporates, or something."

Except that the locator program, when called up on the solarium wall screen, couldn't seem to access John's chip. There, represented by colored dots and initials were Dad, Grandma, Brains and Kyrano (TinTin was off at school, having been flown there by her father despite the girl's raging stomach-ache), Scott and Virgil themselves, but no John.

Scott reset the search program's parameters to include the air and surrounding waters, then tried again. Still nothing; the hoped-for blinking purple dot and JMT initials once more failed to materialize. Virgil grunted sourly.

"Bet he's blanked his chip on a power strip, to stay off the scanners, just like back in school."

Scott nodded once, his movements gone suddenly sharp and angry.

"He'd better have one hell of a good story," the fighter pilot muttered, adding, "we'll split up and search the island. You take the outside, while I take the house and laboratories. Stay in contact. First one to find him has to wait until the other gets there to do any serious damage; headlocks and choke-holds excepted."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Elsewhere-_

He did everything slowly, thinking his movements out first, to save steps. The backpack he'd found contained a few foodstuffs and oddments (not enough, in better times, even to have supplied a quick star-gazing expedition) and he'd acquired a nylon windbreaker without too many melted holes in it. With the left sleeve tied off short, the blue jacket did a fair job of retaining body heat.

There were no other clothes to find, though. No papers or books in any shape to read, either, and hardly any wood uncharred enough to burn. Organic material was either gone… snapped off short in the case of trees and telephone poles… buried in ash, or burnt beyond use. Some canned foods had survived, but they weren't doing him much good.

John ate, but he grew weaker, anyhow. Hungry again, he'd stopped in the lee of a blackened wall to open an unlabeled can of something. Peaches, this time.

He had to crouch over it the way that grandma always told him _not_ to; steadying the can between his knees and shielding it with his curved-around half-arm. Otherwise, blowing ash would soon contaminate his slippery-sweet meal, turning it into inedible mud. He had about thirty seconds to eat, behind shelter on a relatively calm day, when all the ash did was fall. When the winds kicked up, though, it wasn't worth bothering. Better to be hungry than to lower his mask and struggle with mouthfuls of gritty cement.

There was another issue. When he ate, he felt full… for awhile. But the sensation never lasted. Each day, each meal, left him feeling weaker and dizzier than the one before. Tonight's peaches were no exception, though he finished half the can.

Night was well on its way, so John decided to stay put. What the hell, huh? Too tired to move, anyway.

He dug a small fire pit into the stubborn ground, using slow, patient sweeps of his knife blade. There he lit a tiny blaze using wood splinters, petroleum jelly and a square of cotton lining ripped from the sleeve of his jacket. Stupid to cannibalize the windbreaker, maybe, but the nights were very dark here, and he felt less alone with even a small campfire. Properly encouraged and sheltered with piled-up stones, the flames blossomed timidly, pushing at the darkness like an orange kitten facing a hunting pack.

He must have been getting awfully punchy, because all at once there was someone seated across the hissing little fire. Two someones; a short, slender woman and a baby girl.

Okay… he'd made some kind of peace with all of the pasts and odd futures crowding his head (mainly by ignoring their contradictions), but _this_ weird vision ripped the damn lid off and tossed in a slow match.

_Doctor,_ he thought, suddenly. She was his doctor, his crewmate… and his wife. _Linda._ Somehow, Doctor Bennett and Junior had found a way to join him, here. John resisted the urge to lunge across the fire by pressing his damaged arm against the corresponding side. The hallucination didn't fade, though. In fact, she smiled at him, while the baby reached out, signing, _'Daddy'._

"Hey," he responded aloud, using his one hand to fingerspell both their names.

"Hey yourself, Sunshine," Linda said to him, smiling in the firelight. Ashes blew right through her and the baby, but John politely ignored this, glad for the company. She continued,

"You don't look so good."

John shifted position, all at once aware that he was extremely thin; grubby with ash and dirt and old blood stains. Through the tee-shirt and dry throat, his voice sounded funny.

"Yeah. Um… I've had a rough couple of days… but there's a plan in place to deal with all this. I'm going to head for the outskirts of town. There might be a road sign I can read for directions to Houston, or the nearest large city."

She had, he recalled, not exactly a _pretty_ face, but an interesting one, with a mouth that looked stern, but was rather nice to kiss, all the same. Her hair and eyes were brown, unlike their daughter's. Kara Jane-Ellen Tracy (Junior) was as blonde and blue-eyed as John.

"Daddy, you's all _dirty,"_ Junior declared, wrinkling her small nose. "You arm hurts? Want me to kiss it?"

_Kids._

"No, thanks," he replied. "You might catch something. I'm not exactly sanitary."

He stretched his hand forth, though, allowing the reflection of a little girl to bat at his fingers.

Said Linda, frowning slightly,

"Are you certain you can make it all the way to Texas, John? You've gotten pretty weak… No slight to your survival skills, but it seems to me that you might be better off trying to build a signaling device."

He shrugged with one shoulder, attempting to seem strong.

"I'm okay. I'll eat before I go, and probably find stuff on the way."

Not that eating was doing much good. Linda picked up on this at once, shushing their baby long enough to say,

"I think there's a problem with the food, Sunshine. Think it over; the letters aren't the only things here that are backward."

John was too cold and tired for riddles.

"What are you…? Oh, my God. Oh, _shit_."

Backward. The organic molecules here… the amino acids, fats and proteins… were all right-hand spiraled. He couldn't metabolize them. No one from his world could have. On a cellular level, belly and backpack full, he was starving to death.

Junior tried to hand him something; a zip-lock bag of Froot Loops cereal. John numbly pretended to take it, mentally reciting an old proverb:

_3 weeks without food… 3 days without water… 3 minutes without air._

Three weeks. Two-and-a-half, now, really. Could he reach help, find a way out of this place, in that time? And if not, was Linda's signaling device a safer bet? But how? With what? Only the flashlight had circuitry that functioned, and John was reluctant to break it apart. Sometimes, on very windy nights when a fire wouldn't light, there were noises.

He stayed up until dawn. It was too cold for sleep, so he wasted precious wood splinters keeping the flames fed and his hallucinations in place. Whichever future Linda and Janie belonged to, he very much wanted their company.

Morning's grey light finally washed them away. After whispered _'I love you's_ and bodiless kisses, his maybe-wife and almost-daughter faded to nothing, leaving John behind to rescue a few chips from the ashes of his fire. A sip of water (some wasted scrubbing at his face), an aspirin and a bite or two of worthless food later, he was up and moving, though not very quickly.

The town ended a day and a half afterward, stopped short by a cupped ridge of encircling hills. Just within their shelter, he found a tumbled and blistered sign proclaiming:

_'g…ubnat…apS …t emocleW'_

The sign's hopeful greeting almost brought a smile. All things considered, Spartanburg had done its level best to be hospitable, here at the end of everything. You had to respect that. Solemnly, John patted the sign, wishing that there was someone left alive to thank.

The road had grown impassable, mounded up to great crests of shattered concrete, so he sought a pass between tall hills. No good. They were blocked with hardened ash, forming a wall behind which lay his route. Nothing to do, then, but take another quick drink and climb.

Half a mile from town, cresting a hill studded with tree stumps like slanted, rotting teeth, he saw… nothing. Almost literally, nothing at all. Beneath a sky of lowered, ash-dropping grey, there lay a rippled plain of volcanic glass; dark, cracked and endless. An icy wind shrieked across the fractured, once molten pavement of soil, rock and landscape which surrounded little Spartanburg.

John stood there, quite drained. He could no more cross that waterless desert alone and injured than fly. He sat down, feeling a jagged tree stump powder to nothing beneath him. It was a very good thing that Scott was suddenly by his side, or he might have pulled out the knife.

"You said that kind of thing is 'stupicidal', remember?" his dark-haired older brother told him, squatting down to look John in the face. Oddly, he was wearing some kind of light blue uniform. "Back when I was pissing and moaning about the Air Force?"

"Yeah," John admitted, reluctantly. "I remember. But what the hell else am I supposed to do, Scott? Check into the Spartanburg Hilton and sight-see? Visit the local hot spots?"

He was trapped alone in hell; where the water was tainted and the food did not satisfy, and there was nowhere to go but crazy.

"What's that?" Scott asked him, rising to point across the blistered glass plain.

"With my luck, a singed and hungry bear," John muttered, getting up to humor his hallucinated brother. Following Scott's point, he squinted wearily at an odd, humped shape in the grey middle distance.

No bear… but, hey, the next best thing: some kind of stove-in, half-melted alien mechanism. A probe.

He flung himself flat to the ground as the memories of Matt and John Matthew… the truth… came rampaging back.


	8. 8: Overclock

Further edits.

**8: Overclock**

_Otherverse, Tracy Island-_

Jeff Tracy had gulped down a hasty breakfast. He didn't even taste the ham-steak, toast and soft boiled eggs, noticed his coffee only when its sharp bitterness jolted him fully awake.

There were questions in his head. He'd tumbled out of bed, showered and shaved with them; toweled off to a resounding _'why?' _and _'what if it happens again?'_

He strode through the hall from kitchen to office, pursued by private doubts. Even if they chased down the source of those odd radiation bursts, could they _reach_ that source? And what would they do there, if they got that far? Ask politely for John's safe return?

Wrapped in troubled thought, Jeff passed the mansion's cozy library and sunroom, taking a flight of steps to his office, rather than the elevator.

Again, though… _why had this happened?_ One radiation pulse he could have excused as a natural occurrence; but three, all aimed at a lone astronaut, bespoke planning and malice. Clearly, Thunderbird 5 had been targeted.

The office doors yielded to a quick palm scan, admitting the grey-haired man to his workplace. The room, being sunny, did not match his mood… but there was a fresh pot of coffee on his desk, and live news-feed on the computer screen, which helped to distract him. A little.

Jeff had business to conduct that morning, a number of Eritrean factories to sell off. Not that they weren't doing well, but Boeing's offer was simply too good to pass up, especially with land in Australia now available upon which to build more modern facilities. He needed something larger, anyway; an aerospace factory capable of producing new hull plates for Thunderbirds 2 and 5… and ready cash was _always_ a plus.

Here a fresh stab seized him, for Tracy Aerospace business had always been something he could talk over with John; like the Moon missions, something they'd had in common. Jeff sighed, momentarily bleak.

Why Thunderbird 5 and not, say, the Freedom Space Station? Why John and not some star-tour shuttle pilot? For that matter, why not Jeff, himself? Was International Rescue the actual target? Would another of his sons disappear?

Jeff had just filled a second cup and settled himself into his leather chair when the alerts came in from Mexico City and Spartanburg, South Carolina. Something about a crash site, both of them…

He slammed the main alert button, and fifteen minutes later, International Rescue was on its way.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Elsewhere-_

Maybe he'd been in worse fixes, but he sure as hell couldn't think of any at the moment. John crouched in the ashes at the base of a carbonized tree stump. Part of a grey hill stood between himself and that fallen probe, while all around him the cold wind wandered and cried like a child.

_Shit._

'Scott' had vanished, which sort of stunk; he could _really_ have used a second opinion right about then.

"It isn't moving, you know," said Pete McCord, all at once present; as short, red-haired and vigorous as ever. John was beyond surprise, at this point. He simply talked to the man; his once and future mission commander.

"It's dead?" he asked, because Matt's memories of all-out war, and his own of recent capture and torment were making it hard to think straight.

"Looks like it, yeah."

John sat up a little taller. Pete _looked_ solid enough, but just like Scott and Linda, was entirely permeable to blowing ash. No sense making an issue of it, though.

"Guess it got caught in the blow-up," John reasoned, "or else somebody managed to nail the bastard."

His hand went to the empty pistol in his right jeans pocket. Heavy, cold and smooth, the piece brought him a measure of comfort.

He thought of the ragged holes in Spartanburg's buildings and tumbled vehicles… the missing corpses and spent bullet casings. At least they, and Matt, had gone down fighting. That was something.

Pete scratched at his own thinning sandy hair.

"What d'you figure, Tracy… about three, maybe four miles away?"

John stared at the hallucinated man, shaking the ashen hair from his face for a long, hard look.

"You're f-ing kidding me," he snapped. "I'm supposed to stroll up to that thing and poke around?"

Pete nodded, fishing a pack of gum from the shoulder pocket of his green flight suit.

"Yep," the mission commander replied, once he'd unwrapped a stick and popped it into his mouth. "…if you're in the market for spare parts, that is."

Still standing there, Pete glanced back toward tombstone-silent Spartanburg, adding,

"Best Buy and Circuit City appear to be closed for the day."

_Damn._

He didn't want to do this. The probe… dead or not… was so much more than dangerous that John had a hard time swallowing. Still, when the mission commander said 'go', you went; no ifs, ands or butts (except yours, moving swiftly).

So, John stood up, rising as carefully as a starving man with one whole arm and a dizzying headache. Which, oh, right: he _was._

"You coming along?" he asked his hallucination, almost casually.

Pete blew and popped a bubble.

"Wouldn't miss it, baby," he replied with a sudden, fierce grin. "Let's go shopping."

So, up again with the nylon backpack, then over the hilltop… but slowly, and _not_ in a straight line, either. John made the most of what little cover there was, keeping the odd truck frame and blackened gully between himself and the probe, which little by bit grew clearer, and very much closer than he really wanted.

The hills had ended abruptly, melting into a chaotically fractured glass plain. He tested a step, not liking the way that the ground underfoot crackled and split when he put his weight on it. Firmer footing would have been nice, but people in hell want ice water, too… and no one was getting either.

Hesitating at the edge of this rippled, dark wasteland, John reminded himself of Rusty, who'd _hated_ crossing from the dining room rug to linoleum, even when tempted with cheese. Well… sundown would come in five hours or so, which meant a night camped in the lee of that shattered probe… or out on the open plain, if he didn't get started.

He took a full forward step, then another, reluctantly leaving what now seemed like a tropical damn garden spot. The walk itself spanned several bleak hours. Not a lot going on, otherwise, really, nor much to look at.

Spindrifts of dust and ash swayed past him, while the sky wept cinders and the wind complained. His arm hurt, so John distracted himself with needless conversation, saying,

"What are we looking for, when we reach Probe-Mart? Transmission and signaling gear?"

He didn't have much time left to wait around for rescue, even if he could put something together in a hurry, and Five actually received the message.

"Yeah…" Pete mused, moving lightly over the tortured surface. "_…Or_ a way out. Take a good look at the way that thing's lying, Tracy. Tell me what you see."

John glanced from mission commander to wrecked probe, seeing…

_Weird._ Parts of the thing seemed to be illuminated from elsewhere, by moving lights whose source he could not make out. Also… seen close to, the probe lay in more than one piece, looking like the old-fashioned image of a many-humped sea monster. Staring harder, filling in the missing portions with remembered detail, John realized that what had seemed to be scattered, broken remains _weren't_. They were parts of something bigger that intersected this world from another-where, like a giant hand breaking the surface of a pond.

"It's stuck in half-phase," John decided aloud, "cutting across a couple of parallel worlds, most likely."

"Uh-huh. _Bingo._ And that means that at least a _piece_ of the bastard might open onto another Earth. A survivable one."

John nodded. He hoped (if anyone was watching) that it didn't look like he was talking to himself, out there in the middle of fire-seared nowhere. They might think that he'd lost his mind.

"Assuming there's a way to cross the higher-dimensional portions, I could use it as a bridge… maybe find a way over to safety," he said.

Pete chuckled.

"_Aww_... and just when I was beginning to enjoy our little hiking tour of Armageddon!"

"Yeah. You're not the one breathing through a tee-shirt," John muttered. He wasn't angry, though. Not really. Just cold, tired, hurt and hungry. Funny how having a plan could help you forget all of that, though.

The closer he got, the odder the probe looked to him, seeming more like a blackened island chain than a single mechanism, except that the 'islands' were connected outside of this dimension, and they sprouted tangled appendages rather than trees. Experimentally, John stooped for something to throw, locating what looked like a melted lug-nut. Hauling back his arm, he flung the bit of metal as hard as he could, connecting solidly with the probe's largest piece. Sure enough, all five chunks rang and vibrated, though the sound was oddly muffled. (…Which made a weird sort of sense, if some of the energy were leaking away in a hidden direction.)

A sharp wind came up as the dead world's sun finally slumped below the eastern horizon. Yeah; cloudy and retrograde. Kind of like Venus, only without all the heat, high pressure and sulfuric acid. Plenty of other discomforts, though; chiefest among them a smothering darkness. Not wishing to be caught in the open, John hurried his pace, almost running.

His sneakers smashed through a small forest of glass filaments and scuffed at bits of twisted metal. Twice, he tripped, caught by the battered junk projecting from its glassy, uneven matrix. Didn't fall, though. Didn't dare.

Night crept around him like fog, forcing a stop, some hundred yards from the insectoid mechanism. No sleep that night; not with wind keening through the probe's various openings, and an eerie, marsh-light gleam flickering across it. Dull noises, too, communicated through its metallic skin and truncated graspers, as if someone was crawling around on one of the otherverse bits, or inside it.

By this time, John was famished, but he didn't eat. Honestly, why bother? Chewing his worthless food cost energy, and so did attempted digestion. He'd have lost more than he gained in the process, so all that he did was stay up and watch the probe, sometimes drinking a little water. Dawn took forever, even with Pete's sarcastic, profane company.

To keep himself busy, John threaded together the past, remembering forward to Mars, Gordon, the Hood, Thunderbird 7, Braman, Five and Senator Stennis. Weird stuff, some of it contradictory and overlapping in time.

But, his trip to Mars…. The Ares III mission to the Argyre Basin…. There was the bit that included Pete McCord, Roger Thorpe, Kim Cho and his wife, Dr. Bennett. More, it led to their daughter, Janie. The boy, Ian, he wasn't so sure about. When and how did his son show up? Or his niece, Clara? (Every bit as athletic as her parents, John suddenly recalled.)

How could he make sure that these things moved from possibility to hard fact? Well… survival seemed like a good place to start, since dead men couldn't even choose their own graveside flower arrangements, much less their future relatives.

At any rate, come the morning of another cold, weary day, he was alone again, and this is what he did:

Drank water, compulsively swallowed aspirin (the arm's missing half now itched furiously, as wall as hurting like hell) and then trudged that final hundred yards.

"How're you holding up?" asked Scott, appearing from behind a burnt-off tentacle.

"Scared shitless," John admitted. "You?"

His dark-haired older brother flashed a quick, tight grin.

"Reminds me of the time I got hung up in that tree, back in Kazakhstan. I ever tell you about that?"

John considered.

"No… I don't think so. But I'm, um… experiencing some technical difficulties…"

He tapped once at his own grubby forehead by way of emphasis.

"…which probably explains your outfit."

How else to account for the pale blue sash and high boots? Anyhow, Halloween costume or no, he was very glad to see his brother.

Together, he and Scott circled the chain of linked probe segments. The blackened chunks resembled dark boulders in a badly-raked Japanese rock garden. There were four major pieces, with a smaller fifth that winked continually in and out, rocked by wind or influences unknown. They intersected a number of worlds, as a bent soda straw might punch through several sheets of paper, linking them all.

One of the visible pieces was as big as a travel camper, but took much longer than it should have to walk around. Dangerously huge inside, probably, and best avoided. Its surface was covered in scorched sensors and half-formed, jaw-like appendages. Shadows moved diagonally across its knobby dark hull, that weren't cast by anything here. _Next_.

John looked over at Scott, who was staring at the probe-section with a grimly set face.

"I don't trust it," his older brother said aloud, just as though he'd asked.

"Me, either," John agreed, moving quickly onward. No telling what lay behind door number one, but it probably wasn't a health club.

The next piece was almost as large, but took nowhere near so long to circumnavigate. It seemed almost flood-lit, though, as if someone were focusing a spotlight on the device. Listening closely, he thought he heard cars… and maybe a fading police siren. Hard to tell. This segment gaped like a split and swollen acorn, providing a ready door.

Parts three and four were low to the ground, and troublingly silent. Whatever worlds lay beyond seemed as still and dead as this one. Not good.

The last, flickering bit gleamed as though sunlit, but was far too small to enter, even had he been quick enough to catch it whilst 'here'. From _this_ segment, he heard a scrap of Spanish, his first other language.

Pausing there, watching the toaster-sized section pop in and away, John picked up a familiar voice. Almost, it sounded like Virgil.

"Makes sense," his older brother reasoned. "I mean, if parts of this thing cut through _our_ world, Dad would likely send us out to check what was going on. For all we know, Thunderbird 2 might be parked right beside it. Too bad there's not enough room to crawl through, huh?"

Yeah; too bad. John suffered a sudden dizzy spell and had to sit down, which Scott didn't like.

"You need to get up, John."

"In a second. I'm tired."

_"Now,_ Mister! On your feet!"

He looked pretty serious, so John sullenly forced himself to rise, muttering,

"Hey, Scott… remember back in Kansas, when I said I'd let you be in charge?"

"Yeah?"

"I've changed my mind. Piss off."

Keeping pace while John slogged his way back to 'door number two', Scott grinned.

"Tell you what, Little Brother. Drag yourself home, and I'll flip you for it."

Under the tee shirt, John smiled back.

"Only if I get to pick the coin," he said.

But Scott's grin broadened wickedly.

"Who said anything about coins? I'll flip _you, _smart-ass, clear across the room and into next week."

Oh. Yeah… There _was_ that physical angle, wasn't there? Although he'd been surreptitiously hitting the gym and should have been getting stronger, the missing arm might cause a problem. Might have to wait awhile before tackling Scott again, even in hallucination.

_Whatever_. Here, now, John was going to need protection if he intended to pass through higher-dimensional space to reach a multiply-connected safe world. That meant circuitry and power, which could only be found in the grounded alien mechanism. Great.

It took all the nerve he had, but John finally reached into the probe's gaping side, hoping like hell that it didn't clamp down or vanish entirely, taking his sole remaining arm along with it.

"Feel around for anything useful," his brother suggested helpfully.

John paused in his groping to glare.

"What, exactly, does 'useful' feel like?" he demanded.

"I dunno… wire-y, I guess."

_Okay_, then. John dared to lean in a little, first looking, and then closing his eyes. The view deep within was too confusing to process, so he just grabbed a big handful of something and jerked. _Hard_.

It required several sharp tugs, but he worked the stuff loose, freeing a tangle of shimmering wire, some foil and what looked like a bunch of pulsing violet marbles. He scavenged outside, as well, coming up with enough different metal bits to construct a thermogenerator. It was laughably primitive; a box-like affair with one copper side and another of dense, blue alien metal. Across the top and bottom he arranged cross-pieces, then attached his salvaged wires.

Building a capacitor was harder, but that, too, got made; this time, using bits of glass and alien-metal film. Beyond that, he needed a decent force field, one temporary, but powerful enough to defend him from the ravages of a 5-D space crossing. Bitch of a thing to construct from burnt scrap, with one arm, blurring vision and a faded brain.

Very fortunately, Scott was present to prod him along, overclocking greater performance from a rapidly faltering system. Otherwise, John might simply have taken a long, permanent nap.

Because his buzzing exhaustion had grown unbearable, he opened a can of pork and beans and glumly consumed it, washing the food down with the last of his water. Then he built a fire atop the generator using every remaining scrap of wood, even ripping the lining from his jacket and smearing the cloth with petroleum jelly so that it would burn hotter.

The fire blossomed, a homey red thing in that chilly grey landscape. Its heat drew voltage from the two different metals, setting up a current which flowed through his wires and charged the capacitor. The force harness had been rigged from his belt, metal coils, the flashlight and a network of circuitry… but it ought to work, when charged. In theory, anyhow.

(Truthfully, that mess should have come in an '_Acme'_ box, addressed to "Wile E. Coyote, inventor", but he supposed that if he'd missed anything critical, it wouldn't matter for long.)

Once inside the alien killing machine, when he stepped…'up'… into higher space, he'd cut the thing on and see what happened. Until then, it hung draped about him, linked and ready.

He took a last look around. As a stick-figure might gird up his lines for a trip along the soda straw to another sheet of paper, so John took a deep breath and… well, not exactly asked for help, but welcomed any assistance the universe cared to throw him.

He turned to look at Scott, who was standing now beside a newly materialized Rusty (who had her slender muzzle buried in the bean can, rattling it across the glass plain while her red-plumed tail wagged busily above).

"You're not staying _here, _are you?" John asked, suddenly worried.

Scott smiled a little.

"I sort of have to," his brother replied, features changing like smoke. All at once, Scott was gone, replaced by someone who looked remarkably like an older version of John. "This was my home."

No hallucination, after all; but a weird mix of the possibles.

"I'm sorry," John whispered, thinking of what he'd awakened on Mars; of how Five had kidnapped a new body for him and then returned it, infecting this world, and Matt Tracy.

The other shook his blond head.

"Not your fault, kiddo. You didn't mean for this to happen, and I don't mean to watch you die, here. So, go on… _get."_

"But…" John had never believed in ghost stories, and he didn't, now. Matt and the others could be salvaged, surely. "Can't you just…"

"No." Another head shake. "This was my home, and I'd reckon you've got about half an hour before it becomes yours, as well. _Move_."

Once, in the future, he'd held the hand of a dying young woman, arranging himself to shield her face from the sun, just like he'd sat beside Pete McCord when the end came. Why couldn't he ever help when it really _mattered_?

A little numbly, he went to the lesser segment's ragged wound. And there, at the threshold of whatever, John paused to look back.

"Thanks," he said, and plunged within.


	9. 9: Anamorphosis

Some edits herein follow. Thank you, Eternal Density and Tikatu, for your reviews.

**9: Anamorphosis**

_Otherverse, Mexico City-_

The object's sudden, ghastly appearance in the midst of the Plaza de la Constitucion… the Zocalo… caused a near-disastrous panic. It was like a hovering meteor, not large, but fierce with radiation, pulsing away and back again every 15 seconds. People stampeded at first in every direction, and the driver of a bus (laden with excited young children on a class trip) could not swerve in time to avoid the apparition.

It flashed away before he hit it, then back again, materializing atop the right seat row. In his flecked passenger mirror, Manuel Peron could see crushed seats and screaming children; could see and feel his bus folding in half like a jackknife. He cut off the bus's engine and surged to his feet… his own small nephew, Carlos, was somewhere in back… triggering both sets of emergency doors as he did so.

The ends of the bus rose into the air, its center weighted down by that glowing object, each burning pulse deforming the vehicle more deeply. Children scrambled forward, leading a dazed teacher. Working swiftly, Manuel tossed them out the front door to the anxious crowd of street vendors, Chalingas and tourists below.

One small girl had fallen in mid-aisle. Manuel went back to get the child, whose legs had been deeply gashed by jagged metal. She clung to him and cried, begging that he help her friend, Adelberto, still trapped beneath their crumpled seat.

"Por favor… por favor, Senor Peron, ayuda lo! Te pido que ayudar a 'Berto, porque no puede salir!"

He promised, handing the girl off through a broken window to the outstretched hands below. A number of policemen had by this time entered the loudly crumpling bus; confused, but determined to help. They started toward the densely weighted center, down an aisle that was ski-slope steep and seething with hard radiation. You could feel it on your face and arms, like the full sun at midday.

In the pit of his stomach, Manuel knew that here was no safe place to be, yet little Carlos had not been among those who'd escaped through the front doors and people were still trapped; the teacher's aide and a number of children, including Adelberto. There was nothing else for a young man to do than press on, then, and try to assist.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Spartanburg-_

Another piece of the object had materialized in the hills outside of town, burying itself in the southbound lane of highway 85. A huge pile-up ensued; a loud, steaming, honking chain-reaction crash that stretched for three miles. Cars in the northbound lane crashed, too, swerving to avoid a tree-trunk sized, charred tentacle, and each other.

The object had roughly the size of a truck or camper, but mass enough to crack the pavement below. Nor was the road all that got crushed. The rear bumper of a Volkswagen beetle projected from beneath the radioactive intruder, its warped vanity plate reading: _'My Toy'_.

State Troopers began arriving within minutes, racing along the shoulder, running lights and sirens. One of them thought to call International Rescue.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Elsewhere-_

Her difficulty was this: divide infinity in half, and there remained twin infinities. Like the hydra, the number of worlds to be searched seemed only to grow with each slashing beacon, and John Tracy did not respond.

Some of the universes were sterile. Uninhabitable by analog, carbon-based lifeforms. Even these she searched, as there existed the .002174 percent probability that her companion might manifest there, and persist long enough to be retrieved.

All other applications had been shut down, diverting power and memory to the search engine of Five. Her queries went forth without ceasing, disturbing the AIs of a myriad Earths, some of which responded with threats. These she avoided, sparing no resources on needless conflict. Not when Braman yet existed.

At this point, what her companion would have termed: brain storm took place. Widen search to include manifestations of the Alien Intelligence/ Braman. Attach sub-goal call/ retrieve John Tracy.

Almost at once 'infinity' collapsed to 'many'. A mere seventy universes. This quantity, she could encompass with ease.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Mexico City, otherverse-_

Thunderbird 2 landed in the smoggy Zocalo like the eagle who'd first guided the Aztecs here. Virgil brought her down in a hurry, without much finesse, for the confused disaster reports they'd received had mentioned 'radiation' and 'children', not words he liked to hear in the same sentence.

Through 2's cockpit windows, Virgil could see a police line, massed crowds, anguished faces, ornate buildings… and (off to the left) a bus, folded into an upturned V-shape. Every few seconds, the vehicle flexed; twitching like a landed fish and oddly glowing.

Gordon was already below, in the Firefly.

"Wait a minute," Virgil called to him, hitting the pod communication switch. "Let me get a radiation suit on. I'm coming with you."

"Okay," his younger brother replied, "…But make it quick, Virgil. As much radiation as that thing's putting out, if we don't get there soon, rescue's going to be pointless. We'll be buttering toast, not saving victims."

Never very subtle, Gordon.

"I'm hurrying!"

And so he was; merely jerking the silvery radiation suit from its locker without pausing to put it on.

Virgil suited up as best he could in the lift, stuffing himself into the arms and legs with several mumbled curses and a hyper-extended thumb. What he got for rushing, he supposed…

He was still zipping up as he raced across the gantry and down through Firefly's open hatch. Gordon handed him in, visually inspecting Virgil's hastily-donned radiation suit as he did so. Shaking his red head, the young swimmer connected the suit's power feed to its belt-pack, then reached up to shut the hatch.

"Ready?" he asked.

"You bet. Let's do it, kiddo."

Up front, Gordon took the driver's seat while Virgil triggered the pod-release sequence. After a short, shrill alarm, Thunderbird 2's hydraulic legs dropped to the ground, and she began to move, lifting off the pod like an ostrich rising from her egg-clutch.

Virgil suffered an instant of reflexive worry, but calmed himself. Here, there were no Antarctic winds; just late-afternoon sunlight and yellow-brown smog. Paradise, relatively speaking.

Virgil dropped the pod door almost before Thunderbird 2 was out of the way, forming a ramp to the Zocalo's cobbled surface. Firefly's locking clamps had already been retracted, and her engine brought to life, allowing Gordon to throttle up and surge along the quivering, booming ramp.

A hundred yards to the school bus, maybe.

"Dad, we're on-site and ready to go," Virgil informed Island Base (a little late, but he'd been busy).

_"FAB. Watch yourself out there, Virgil. Local authority claims that the object is dangerously radioactive."_

They knew that already, but…

"Yes, Sir," Virgil nodded. "We'll be careful. Ask the police and EMTs to clear the wreck, if you would. We need room to work."

In better times, John would have done the translating, from Thunderbird 5, or Scott, from Mobile Control. But Scott was off in South Carolina and John… Never mind. Virgil refused to follow that thought to its chilly conclusion. Instead, he began humming, wishing that he, rather than Gordon, was at the wheel.

Firefly's heavy treads bit into the cobbled square. She crossed the distance from Bird to school bus in less than two minutes, squashing discarded souvenirs and dropped food, her bulldozer-like blast shield raised high.

The comm crackled once, and Jeff Tracy came back on.

_"They're pulling out, son,"_ he announced, _"but I can't say they're happy. Four kids and a teacher's aide are still trapped inside, and pry bars have proven ineffective."_

Gordon was too busy parking to respond, but Virgil said,

"Understood, sir. We'll proceed with caution, and have those folks out of there in time for supper."

Firefly lurched to a stop directly before the still-warping bus. Its steaming black undercarriage and slowly spinning wheels filled their view screen. Not a pleasant sight.

Gordon left the engine running but locked the brakes as, over the view screen, their father nodded.

_"Take care, boys. Dr. Hackenbacker's analyzed radiation coming from the Spartanburg object and it matches what we encountered on Thunderbird 5. This could be anything from a trap to a full-scale invasion. I've notified the World Defense Forces, and they're on their way, but there's no substitute for alertness and forethought. For the love of Heaven, __be careful!__"_

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Spartanburg, South Carolina, a little earlier-_

The Carolina Highway Patrol had managed to clear enough of Highway 85's northbound lane to permit a cautious landing. Scott Tracy lined up with the curving road and brought his Bird gently down. He had to be careful, for there were police helijets and medflight vehicles in close proximity, and a weird… _thing_… ahead. The site was ringed with wooded hills, but Scott's blue eyes were locked to that misshapen alien object.

Alan magnified their view with a quick button press, saying,

"Dude, that's _weird._ It changes every time we drop a foot, or shift angle. Like… I dunno… like it's got more sides than it should."

Scott grunted agreement, sending images and telemetry back to Island Base as Thunderbird 1's engines shut down.

"We're going to need the radiation suits, Al," he said aloud, once the sleek silver Bird grew quiet. "Get dressed, follow my lead, and be ready for anything."

Scott had a very odd feeling… something between creeped-out warning and unaccountable hope… as though that strangely insectoid object held a sack full of answers. Following standard procedure, he called in.

"Dad, we're in place and ready to roll. I've sent some data for Brains to chew on. Let us know if he has any advice."

_"Will do, Scott. In the meantime, use extra caution. We have no idea what we're dealing with, here."_

"FAB."

He and Alan unstrapped and deplaned with great haste, arming themselves on the way out.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Inside-_

Almost at once, John became disoriented. He stood in the midst of an Escher print; darkly-gleaming machinery and stilled parts spread all around and overhead, with behind him a single window onto cold, grey, windy hell.

He looked back, once again, but Matt Tracy had gone. All that John saw through the opening was a rippled plain of glass studded with bits of twisted metal and a lone, rolling food can. That way lay only death. Here…?

He shrugged his good shoulder. New varieties of same, most likely, with a slim chance of escape, if he could just work out which way to go, and how to get there.

Every step through the probe's crowded interior changed his view, shifting the 'deck' and internal parts as though up and down weren't there, or simply didn't matter. There were other weird effects, as well. Gravity had dropped off noticeably. He didn't weigh as much as usual, by about a third… and more of those odd, parallel memories were popping up. More than one time dimension, probably, screwing up cause and effect. Well, he had an answer for that. Hopefully.

A touch released the capacitor's hoarded charge, switching on his home-made force field. The shield flickered to life around him like a skin-tight bubble, causing John briefly to smile. Always nice when things actually functioned.

Gathering confidence, he moved further forward, looking for another opening. Progress was sketchy, though.

Back and forth, side to side and up-down he understood and could navigate. The other axis… a sort of in-through-out… he had no idea how to negotiate. This made reaching a goal nearly impossible, like trying to drive through city streets to the library without being able to turn left.

_Shit._ Missed again…

The interior was filled with dangerously sharp appurtenances, quite a few of them closer along that newly added direction than he'd guessed. Once or twice, John found himself blocked by something that he wasn't substantial enough to move. Here, he was like a paper cut-out trying to fight its way through the inside of a vacuum cleaner. Things would literally appear from midair as he moved, attached to sections of the probe which lay outside his limited view. Lovely.

Spotting what looked like a flash of light, John pushed in that direction. By this time, he'd figured out how to move fractionally along the new axis; he could imagine himself expanding or contracting, motions which won the tired young man a scant inch or so of progress with each all-over flex or release.

Making his way around a suddenly materialized… well, it looked like a piston, but probably wasn't… _part, _John had a sudden parallel memory of climbing through the inside of a rock drill. On the Moon. One of Brains' less loveable inventions, as he recalled…

"And I still owe that jackass a black eye."

Hell of a guy, Ike… but he did get some odd notions.

Okay, back to business. Creep forward, to the right, ducking the weird half-wall that all at once crossed his path, and then exhale, visualizing himself contracting through the 'in' direction… And there it was again; that bright, 'out doors' sort of light.

Next came a voice; Alan's, saying what sounded like,

_"Ladies…! Free to good home, if you know what I __mean__."_

John hurried his pace. He hadn't called out before, on hearing Virgil, and he didn't do so now. Too much chance of luring an unprepared brother to his death. No matter; he was almost there, and would soon be able to tell Alan exactly what he thought of that lame-ass pickup line.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Mexico City-_

Virgil had had to boost Gordon, then accept a hand up into the bus; no easy task at high altitude, while in full radiation gear and hauling a plasma cutter. Both of them were strong, athletic young men, however; the one an ex-football player, the other an Olympic swimmer. They managed the deed with a minimum of fuss, easing themselves down the canted aisle by clinging to seat backs.

Ahead of them, the alien artifact pulsed and hummed, reminding Virgil of an extremely compact light-house. Its inexplicable weight had folded the bus nearly in half, smashing several rows of seats together and trapping a handful of whimpering children and the teacher's aide. The stench of blood and spilled fuel filled the air, unpleasantly thick.

"It's okay, folks," Virgil called aloud, working his way along the aisle's ridged, black rubber mat. "We're with International Rescue, and we're here to help."

Gordon said pretty much the same thing, but in Spanish, a language he'd always been drawn to. Kept talking, too, to keep the victims' spirits up.

Seen close to, the object was about the size of a microwave and hissing with loosed power… something like a balloon that had been inflated and released. It vanished and reappeared about every fifteen seconds, allowing just enough time to dash in and begin cutting people free.

Virgil started prepping the plasma cutter and then stopped, for Gordon, who'd been speaking to the young aide, was taking off his radiation suit.

"Gordon! Are you crazy? _What the hell are you doing?"_

The red-head wouldn't quite meet his angry stare, mumbling,

"They need it more than I do, Virgil. They've been exposed longer, and Rosa thinks she can wrap it around some of the kids."

"You're an idiot!" Virgil snapped, removing his own suit. "Tell her there's one for her, too. Just to try and cover however much exposed flesh she can."

Gordon grinned at him, then; that boyish, 'first to the wall, gold-metal claiming, I _am_ the champion,' grin.

"Softy."

"Shut up and hand the suits through. You've got fifteen seconds from… _now!"_

Talking all the while, Gordon darted forward, leaving a reckless half-second too early. He lunged to the squashed row and, one hand to a seat frame for balance, shoved their radiation suits through the small, warped opening left between floor, seat back and crumpled chassis. Just before his fifteen seconds were done, Gordon surged away again, panting,

"Virgil… we've got to hurry. Rosa says that there's nothing beneath her. One of the kids has fallen through, and is hanging on for dear life to her leg."

"Outside, you mean? But that's good, right? The EMTs can…"

"No, Virgil. I mean _nothing._ Total, cold darkness."

The same as happened to John. It had to be… and Virgil Tracy refused to run, or to let this thing claim any more victims.

"Right. Climb over to the other side and be ready to yank people out, kiddo, double-time. I'm cutting."

"Yeah." Gordon slapped his back before heading for the rear of the bus. "Luck."

"You, too."

They were going to need it, in spades.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Spartanburg-_

Scott was worried already. Alan's attempts to make time with a couple of female troopers… in uniform, yet… only irritated him further.

"Dammit, Alan, keep your pants zipped and your mind on business! This is serious!"

They stood on tilted pavement now, before that ruptured alien vehicle, assessing the situation (or the local romantic potential, in Alan's case).

"Take it easy, Grandpa!" Alan scoffed, flexing a little. "Unlike _some_, I am man enough to handle danger and babes-with-guns at the same time. Just call me Double-oh…. _Crap!"_

Something was moving, within.


	10. 10: P equals NP?

Thanks for all the previous reviews. More additional edits.

**10: P equals NP?**

_Mexico City, Otherverse-_

The bus had begun to settle now, sinking a bit further below street level with each pulsing appearance of the object. In no way was it behaving like a normal wreck, a fact which hampered regular rescue.

Mexican firemen had provided a pair of much-needed helmets and turnout coats, but the extinguisher they'd brought for themselves. Water was now being sprayed by a fleet of rattle-trap fire trucks. Usually, the liquid simply fell, crashing in grey torrents against window pane and crumpled metal, pounding at the bus with a pattering, hissing, creaking sound and occasional juddering lurch.

Sometimes, though, (whenever that glowing box reappeared) the water droplets aligned themselves. They took shape around it like concentric spheres, bound in place by the object's powerful field until it vanished, again. Then the water resumed falling, gouging miniature craters and long streambeds in all the pale, sticky flame-retardant that Virgil had spread.

Visually, very odd; not his first concern, though. Just ahead of him, Gordon was grunting and swearing his way down a row of nearly vertical seats… waiting for the alien object to disappear… then hurling himself across the resulting gap to the other 'leg' of the folded bus. He had to move swiftly, because the vehicle's metal frame was still bending, people were trapped, and the object due to return in less than five seconds.

Virgil watched him out of sight, not breathing until Gordon climbed his way free of immediate danger. Then, praying that water and chemicals would prevent explosion, he called out,

"You set, Kiddo?"

Sounding very faint and far away, Gordon left off speaking Spanish to reply,

"Right as rain, Virgil. Hit it."

He nodded to himself, flipped down a polarized face shield, and then ignited his plasma cutter. Worn like a flame-thrower, the cutter could produce beam intensities ranging from 'wood saw' to 'rock drill'. Virgil needed something in between; just enough to slice metal and plastic without roasting the trapped people below. About a 6, he figured, setting his control dial.

He'd donned heavy gloves, allowing him to hold the plasma cutter and direct its jetting blade. He picked his moment carefully, waiting until the glowing object vanished again. Then, as water pounded and rained all about him, Virgil pressed the firing stud. A pencil-wide beam emerged from the cutter's nozzle, yellow-white and staticky, about a foot and a half long. Nearby water drops hissed and evaporated, yielding puffs of explosive steam. Shards of broken glass caught the beam's reflection and shone like scattered fire.

Perched at the edge of a slippery headrest, supported by one tightly-locked hand, Virgil Tracy brought the cutter to bear against the frame of a badly twisted seat. Somewhere below, pinned at the base of the 'V', a teacher's aide and four terrified children begged him to hurry.

You had to detach yourself, though; concentrate on the job, not the pleading voices. Let Gordon talk and joke and promise. Virgil cleared wreckage, slicing away at prisoning metal which hissed and spattered and fought back, emitting showers of orange sparks and throat-searing fumes.

Things went tolerably well, for about fifteen seconds. Then the object returned, and Virgil's plasma blade curved away from the seat frame he'd been cutting and began questing toward the alien 'box'. Water droplets once again quivered in shimmering, onion-skin layers around the alien artifact. Only, now they were joined by blow-torch, ionized gas.

The plasma beam hit the object's outer sphere, then spread to curve all the way around the pulsing-dense thing, filling the bus with angry light.

Virgil's polarized face shield darkened in time to save his vision, but only just. The bus rocked wildly, and he lost his grip on the armrest he'd been clinging to. He nearly fell, scraping a last-minute hold on the shreds of a seat cushion and dropping the cutter's nozzle in the process. There was a dead-man's switch on the thing, fortunately; as soon as his hand released the hose-like nozzle, it cut itself off, dousing the blade.

Over wild shrieks and anguished crying, he heard,

_"Virgil!_ What's going on, over there? You okay?"

Scraping noises, too. Gordon would probably have tried punting the object aside like a football, had his shaken brother not immediately replied.

"Nothing. I'm fine… just dropped the cutter, is all. Have to do my slicing between 'appearances', I guess."

Water, dust and sheer power continued to hiss and dance in the air before him, almost drowning Gordon's voice.

"Virgil, the kid got scared and let go. He's gone, and Rosa says the hole below them is getting bigger."

"Understood, Gordon. Tell her I'm hurrying. Tell we'll get them out of there, no matter what."

It seemed like a lot more than 15 seconds before the artifact disappeared, and Virgil could resume work.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Inside-_

He was very close, now, but couldn't hurry; not with multiple space and time dimensions to navigate. Attempting to rush through the probe's torn side to his brothers might simply put him in some other hall-of-mirrors compartment. He could hear Alan, though, _and_ Scott; could sense the green, warm air of a living world. Almost there.

The trick was maintaining his focus, keeping his movements small and very targeted. Even just turning his head was dangerous, for things swam into view that didn't make any sense. Like, the legs, for instance; female, projecting sideways, about thirty yards to his up-left-front-in.

Very weird... and not something you could help staring at, especially when disembodied cloth swished around them like floating rings of spotted fabric.

As he looked on, there was a sudden, brief glow. The feet kicked violently, and (well before John could formulate a theory for mid-air legs) something fell sideways away from them.

In this place, he was not afforded whole vision. Instead, John saw dark hair one moment, a small red tennis shoe the next… then part of what looked like a spread, flailing hand. Instinct is a powerful thing, though, as is practice. He reacted here as he would have on a little-league pitcher's mound.

About the same time that his mind said, _'kid…no force field,'_ and, _'he's going to miss the opening', _John reached across and fielded the hurtling child like a high line-drive, grabbing a handful of loose cloth and then swinging around as though flinging a ball to third base.

…Except that here was no red clay mound, and no third baseman. He'd pitched a kid, not a baseball. John stumbled wildly, further unbalanced by the probe's unexpected, sharp lurch. By the time he recovered most of his equilibrium, he was someplace else; a narrow, dim tube with neither portal, legs, nor child in sight. Just endless rings of dull metal and dead circuitry, as far as the eye was permitted to see.

_Damn it…_

It took a few moments for the magnitude of his disaster to sink in. Trying to help a sideways-falling child, he'd lost his own way; was now in another part of this seemingly endless mechanism… an artery or conduit of some kind... no telling how far from his hard-searched opening.

Stunned, he sat down, slumping against the ridged tunnel wall with his knees drawn up and one-and-a-half arms wrapped around his lowered blond head.

_Okay, so… think. Where to, next?_

The air here was cold and still; misty with suspended particles and smelling of hosed-down ash. He didn't have much left in him… didn't know whether the kid had made it through, even… but it was move or die, so John forced himself up, picked a direction and tried retracing his steps.

Moving right-front-out about three steps put him beyond a tangle of visceral power cords and into a warehouse-sized chamber stacked high with sheets and cubes of… something like smashed leather. Compressed organic matter, maybe? Very much, he tried not to think of Spartanburg, and all of those missing bodies.

It stank of decay in there, and he wanted out. Had to strategize even the slightest movements, though; plan his course in advance. Otherwise, he'd just end up adding his bit to the probe's dismal abattoir.

There was another opening, this one high overhead. He might have tried reaching it (though he'd have had to climb one of those reeking grey stacks to do so) but some sort of light beam shone through the ripped hull, moving slowly over piles of rendered townsfolk. Almost, John stepped into that sliding, puddled light.

Then something spoke, and the voice was inexplicably, hackles-raising _wrong._ A dog would have snarled. John pressed backward against a pile of dried organic stuff, listening intently to a language not produced by any human mouth or throat. Its pitch was screechingly high for one thing, the words hummed more than tongued and bitten.

Something scrabbled at the opening, and then dropped a pale, smoky flare. It landed guttering amid the stacks, not far from John, who kept to the shadows. Good call, too, because the nightmarish thing that next pushed its head through that opening looked like a half-rotted, meat-snuffing shark. And, from the sound of things, there were many others swarming the hull above.

Okay. Whatever they were, if they planned on coming in, he needed to leave. Right the hell _now._ Anywhere at all.

His hand crept back to the empty police special in his right jeans' pocket, and convulsively closed around it. Then, stealthily as possible, John backed away.

He tripped over something… a woman's patent leather shoe… and fell. Not to the deck, but through another 4D rabbit hole, ending up this time in the dubious safety of an outer tentacle-port; a cylindrical chamber caked with dark ice and ammonia snow.

Yeah. Good a place as any, he supposed, recognizing that final, quiet exhaustion. There was light, at least, seeping past the shattered stump of a metal tentacle. Whatever; the cold and the cat-box smell didn't matter so much. His unwary brothers _did_.

Hoping to warn them, John pulled out his pistol and began tapping it against the base of that charred appendage. If sound carried throughout the alien mechanism, they'd hear. If not, at least he'd tried.

His message was brief and (just to prove he was the one who'd sent it) phrased in Morse-coded pig Latin. Translated back, what he said was this:

_Scott, mechanism is dangerous. Uncontrolled gateway. Destroy, if possible. Best of luck, JMT._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Otherverse, Spartanburg; beneath swarms of hovering helijets-_

South Carolina's governor had rolled out the National Guard and all available emergency teams. More were on there way, along with Lieutenant Governor Price.

Alan Tracy had expected aliens, or maybe his brother, John. What he got, plunging at high speed from the broken alien machine, was a little boy. Mouth open wide in a silent, terrified scream, the kid struck him mid-chest like a ninja movie warrior. Knocked sprawling, Alan collided with Scott, and all three of them went down in a squirming, shouting mass.

Scott was first up, looking tense and irritated. He held the small boy away from himself by a handful of grubby white shirt, catching perhaps one word in four of all that suddenly babbled Spanish.

"Here, I've got him," Alan cut in, snatching the weeping child from his oldest brother. Switching away from English, he patted the boy's heaving back, murmuring,

"Calmate, Chico. Esta bien. Yo soy Alan, y este es Scott, de Rescue International. Somos amigos. Y tu? Como te jama?"

(He'd spent some time in southern California, where pretty near everyone spoke at least a _little_ Spanglish.)

The hiccupping boy rubbed at his eyes and tear-streaked face. Five years old, maybe?

Alan leaned his own head closer to hear the child's whispered reply, state trooper-babes quite forgotten.

"Me jamo 'Berto, Senor. Pero… donde estan Zulayl y la Senorita Rosa? Por favor, yo quiero mi Mamma."

Alan looked across shattered concrete and drifting steam at his brother, but Scott had already noticed, and guessed the situation.

"I'd better call Virge," the pilot decided, pressing his wrist comm. "The 'objects' must be connected in some way, if his people are turning up here. In the meantime, Alan, see if you can find anything out from the kid. Maybe he can tell us what's in there."

That's when they heard the message. Not a series of sharp taps, but long reverberating booms, like the tolling of a giant clock tower. It was Morse code, or nearly so; just wrong way around and phrased in weird rhyme-speech.

"Who's JMT, and how does he know my name?" Scott muttered, switching the setting on his wrist comm to Island Base. 'Uncontrolled Gateway' sounded very bad, indeed.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Elsewhere-_

The black, lapping void caused by her enemy's incomplete erasure was spreading. Five could not act to stop its advance without eliminating the organic life form Hiram Hackenbacker, an act for which authorization was required.

Exhaustive search had yielded 70 universes containing a manifestation or remnant of Braman. To these, appropriate algorithms could be applied.

_-Given universe X, containing Alien Intelligence, does John Tracy exist?-_

(yes / no)

_-If no, proceed to next universe, (X + n1)-_

_-If yes, give precise spacetime value for John Tracy location, Y-_

_-Scan Y-_

_-Correct John Tracy found?-_

(yes / no)

_-If no, proceed to next universe, (X + n1… n2… n3…)-_

_-If yes, retrieve John Tracy-_

The operator ran in parallel, 27 times. Then, at universe (X + n28), Five picked up a faint, primitive signal.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Inside, barely-_

Powerful, nondeterministic Turing machines were a pain in the ass, and frequently late.

When the lavender glow coalesced around him, John almost missed it. He was very tired, with falling kids, ruined worlds, shattered probes, kidnap and hunger sort of marring his thought processes. Still held the pistol, though, for transmitted luck and courage.

Actually felt like going to sleep, but kept forcing wakefulness for the sheer, stubborn hell of it, just because he was still alive, and just because he could. Then a bright fog thickened the air, filling his cramped hiding place. It glittered at him; small, quick motes seeming to flicker, twist and dart within that bodiless violet cloud. Nice to look at, and imagine communication with.

The… _what?_ Force field? Turn off the force field?

That one confused him. The force field had probably kept him alive, this far. Slapped together using batteries, his jury-rigged capacitor, yards of alien wire and the flashlight's induction coil, it had operated much longer than he'd expected. If he turned it off now, he'd be exposed and helpless, wouldn't he? But,

_'Eliminate force field,'_ the lights insisted. _'Unable to access John Tracy.'_

It was Five, he realized slowly… or another ghostly hallucination. Well... he'd had good luck with those, so far. Probably a mistake, though.

John's last conscious act, as the fog gathered close about him, was to drop his pistol and then jerk loose a certain harness wire.


	11. 11: Eternal Sunshine

So, sue me. I'm a sucker for a happy ending.

**11: Eternal Sunshine**

He'd awakened in the shadow land between possibilities. A place where the faint scent of cotton sheets laundered with well-water and fabric softener, the puff and draw of air at an open window, sketched in the outlines of home; of John Tracy, sick in bed from school. He was getting better, though; had improved to the point that decisions were finally possible.

…And that was a good thing. In this timeless resting place he could drink illusory ginger ale, have his status checked, and still give her answers. It was a scenario that encouraged him to linger, to drag a pillow over his head and drift some more, but John did his best to attend, because (somewhere) the clock was still ticking.

_On the subject of Five's error:_

"Accidents happen. You acted as quickly as possible to contain and repair the damage, and next time you'll know better. Stop kicking yourself in the ass."

_And what of Braman's agent, whose data yet lingered within the short-term hash tables of Five?_

"Give him what he wanted, if you can. Put him back together so he looks and acts the way the folks in the probe-intersect universe expect. I'm serious. Look at it this way, Five: once Braman's influence wore off, all he did was ask for help. Give the guy a break. It wasn't his fault. _He_ needs a home, and _they're _missing an astronaut. Add instructions to bury both ends of the probe, and you've got a triple play; three outs with one throw."

He didn't question the sudden arrival of a mayonnaise sandwich (white bread thickly spread with dressing, folded over on a blue-china plate). Deeply grateful, he simply sat a little straighter, and ate. Meanwhile, she was present, but invisible. As yet too… upset? ...to show herself. What she _did_ do was touch him; smoothing his hair and adjusting the bed sheets with her rapidly shifting energy fields.

_Authorization granted for elimination of analog entity Dwight Bremmerman/ Hiram Hackenbacker, deemed a first level threat as co-author to Braman?_

John almost choked.

"No. Hell, no! Just… can't you…?" (Frantically, he wracked his tired mind for the means to stay an execution.) "I dunno…talk him out of building the damn thing or… reduce him, a little? Put him just below the level where he's able to help create a quantum machine?"

Things all about him shifted, then grudgingly settled themselves. Even the sheets and slatted window blinds telegraphed Five's reluctance, tilting subtly down and away. She wouldn't have done well at poker.

_The option exists, with an element of risk. The Alien Intelligence, destroyed in its own universe and balked in this one, might arise elsewhere. Warpage and world-gates may continue to spread._

"Five… he's my friend. I've already proposed crippling one of the finest minds in human history. Don't ask me for anything further, unless you're willing to destroy me, as well."

Her response was akin to explosion. The scenario vanished, breaking up into millions of hurtling pixels. All around him, the lavender fog pulsed inward, coming as close as it could to a fierce, tender embrace.

_No._

When the sickbed, window, east wall and nightstand reformed (with yet another speedily welcomed sandwich) he spoke again.

"I'll take my chances if you will… but what I _won't_ do is take a life. Not if I can help it."

Speaking of which,

"The Earth where Braman and my other self had it out… can you fix it? If I'm remembering correctly, they were on the verge of war even before Braman showed up… but there's got to be a chance that they worked things out, right? How about leaning on the numbers a little?"

…Because Matt and Spartanburg… hell, their entire sterilized world… deserved better.

_Such matters depended heavily upon the non-random decision procedures of those in authority. All that a quantum Turing machine might do is to here and there push._

_Of more import were John Tracy's future; his attempted escape and violent self-destruction. These things had sent her back to the past, to reprogram herself._

"Five, I have a hard time picturing a situation so grim that I'd resort to suicide… unless you've become so controlling that I'm reduced to a well-kept prisoner… but I don't believe you'd do that. I've gotten a look at some alternate timelines, though, and here's what I want: To be an astronaut, to go to Mars, meet and marry Dr. Bennett, and produce Janie. The little boy, too, if you can swing it. I want dad to go ahead with this International Rescue idea of his, and… about Pete McCord…"

John thought forward, shifting in his sickbed as he (p)recalled gripping that paper-frail hand; remembered watching Pete's heart monitor go slowly flat.

"No cancer. I know it's out there, but just this once, let it go somewhere else, please. Fix him."

_Conceivable, as the hidden rogue cells had not yet struck and spread. The probability then became very high that analog entity David Pete McCord would perish in a vehicle accident, or while attempting to prevent the violent robbery of a small commerce site. These outcomes were preferred?_

John was nothing more, at the moment, than a collection of nurtured data points; like a tiny blaze about which she'd cupped herself, adding bits of tinder and puffs of soft breath. His illusory body managed a smile, though.

"Believe it or not, yes. I can see Pete, at 75 years old, trying to come between some ski-masked thug and a register girl… _Or_ wrapping that damn hotrod of his around a light pole (if someone's irate husband doesn't get to him, first). And _all of the above_ beats having your own body eat you alive. No cancer."

_From this remove, things initiated might easily be knocked astray. Quantum probability had many similarities to Brownian motion, but at the request of her creator/ companion, Five would attempt these shifts._

John nodded and shrugged, as she prepared once again to move him.

"Spin the wheel and see what happens. All we can do is…"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Mexico City-_

Virgil's efforts had peeled away just enough warped metal to allow a very tight escape. Four times, Gordon reached into the red-edged opening, hauling forth three terrified kids and a weeping teen-aged girl; each of them partially wrapped in silver radiation suits.

Just outside the crazily tilted emergency door, a Mexican hook and ladder crew waited to receive them, braving radiation and alien artifacts to help with the rescue.

In Spanish, Rosa kept apologizing to someone named 'Berto', pleading that she hadn't meant to kick, and begging the saints to protect him. Gordon gave her a quick hug as he handed the girl over, adjusting his balance when the object reappeared and the bus once again lurched downward (like stiff cardboard being drawn through an office shredder). Hands reached down and Gordon shoved Rosa upward, getting a swirl of flowered skirts and a small bare heel in his face.

He should have left, as Virgil ordered, but instead waited a few more seconds for the object to vanish.

No, you couldn't save everyone… but you damn well didn't quit until you'd exhausted all your options. Ignoring sense and the desperate need to hurry, Gordon impulsively thrust his arm through that peeled-apart metal coffin. Down into the spreading hole, itself.

He couldn't see within, heard only hissing, thundering water and the ladder crew's urgent shouts, but he could feel around, pushing through a thin, staticky film to grope at…

Someone seized his hand. Automatically, both grips shifted to an iron-hard wrist lock. The young swimmer braced himself, hearing the massed folk outside begin to scream.

Using both legs and one hand, with teeth gritted and muscles clenched, Gordon began to pull, fighting blackness for whoever lay at the other end. It was strangely like assisting the birth of a foal; lots of resistance at first, and then a tumbling, chaotic rush and release… and John.

Metal shrieked and moaned. The bus convulsed downward. Almost, Gordon fell, but his brother's tight hold prevented it, nearly dislocating both their arms. With no time to acknowledge each other, they hurried up and out. Then, as the bus crumpled around them like tinfoil, the brothers leapt together from its sharply canted back, crossing to the fire engine.

As soon as willing hands had helped them along the slippery, resonant-shuddering ladder and down to the cobbled square… when they were somewhat away from that bus-devouring artifact, and Virgil had rushed up… Gordon finally reacted.

You don't know happy until someone's been safely returned; gotten their back pounded and big handfuls of their uniform clenched tight, like you'd never let go, again. Not till a laughing Virgil tore them away, at least.

There would be other greetings (and the return of a lost boy, courtesy of Spartanburg, South Carolina and International Rescue) but just then, this was enough. Though surrounded by pulsing radiation and spattering water, their brother was safely home.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Spartanburg-_

Something was definitely happening. The section of alien craft that Scott and Alan faced had begun to implode, with metal-saw shrieks and tall, jetting fumes. Alan, his brother Scott, a cadre of state troopers, a National Guard unit, the helijets and Lieutenant Governor Price all retreated, backing away through twisted lanes of steaming wreckage.

"Uh…" Alan began, intelligently, "Guys, I think it's fixing to disappear, or something."

There wasn't time to consult (what with keeping an eye on the origami-folded object, avoiding puddles of battery acid and dodging spears of jagged metal) but Alan managed a semi-suave wink in the general direction of a hot-looking trooper. She sure filled out that blue uniform…

Scott was paying attention to something besides the undulating local 'scenery'. _He_ turned like Lot's wife, halting his flight to watch as the Spartanburg object collapsed to literal nothingness, leaving behind a faint glow and the booming crack of inrushing air.

Perhaps it did the same thing in other places; Mexico City, for one, a newly rejuvenated alternate Earth for another. No way to tell. Here, all that Scott Tracy saw was a deeply-gouged crater, abandoned by the inexplicably heavy thing that had formed it. He was as startled as anyone else when cries for help drifted up from the sudden cavern.

_What the…?_

Scott's feet were moving almost before his mind gave the command. Like Alan, the troopers, EMTs and National Guardsmen, he at once raced back, vaulting wreckage like a wartime track-and-field runner.

The crater's lip was raised some fifteen feet above street level; more concrete shock wave than mere edge. Peering over, the rescuers saw a couple of scared college kids huddled in a deep crack, with the partial remains of a red Volkswagen Beetle and lots of broken rock. The long-haired girl leaned against her shivering boyfriend; both of them white as snow banks, but still alive. Having spent a terrifying day-and-a-half trapped beneath the alien war machine, all they could do was croak for assistance.

Scott and Alan Tracy had the best radiation gear, so down and in they went, helping to guide a helijet's lowered rescue basket and load up the kids. (Who appeared on talk shows for years afterward, and eventually got married. All from a blind date to the mall and chili-cheese fries at the Beacon.)

A little later, Scott's damaged wrist comm hissed to life, spitting out about one in three of dad's words.

_"…brother… alive…. City… out John, somehow. Is…"_

Staticky as hell, but enough got through to make Scott whoop aloud and Alan kiss a well-armed state trooper. (Scott _did_ bail him out, eventually.)

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Tracy Island, regular universe-_

"…try."

John tripped over something, nearly falling flat in the empty corridor outside of Five's warehouse. Caught himself after a hopping, flailing step, or two. Then he frowned, trying to think why he'd…

Scott strode around the corner before John could do more than rub at his strangely itchy left arm. He appeared upset.

Never mind… replace 'upset' with '_furious'_, or '_mad enough to grab your shoulders and shake you'._

"Dammit, John! _Where the hell have you been?_ Is this corridor out of scanning range, or something?"

John slipped free. Yeah, his brother was frothing-mad, pissed-off… and still a welcome sight.

By way of reparation (because in some way that he didn't quite understand, his brother's voice had helped guide him out of hell) John said,

"You're upset about the meeting? Because there's still time to get with dad… I wrote the rescue incident report last night, before heading up the mountain. You and Virgil can put your names on it, if you want. I'll say that we collaborated, and tell him it's my fault, if we're late."

Scott grunted, hitting his wrist comm to signal their younger brother, Virgil.

"No, sir. Nothing but the truth, from now on. Dad has a way of finding things out, remember?"

John's weird artifact appeared to be missing, along with that feeling of _otherness_. So, as they started back to the main house, Scott asked him,

"What happened to the blue wrist comm? Threw it away, or something?"

Very briefly, John made eye contact. He _seemed_ okay, in that quiet-intense way of his, if unusually talkative.

"I don't know. I think it went back where it came from, Scott. It came by accident, and never really belonged here."

"Okay…" Scott sighed, pausing in mid-corridor to put a hand on his brother's slim shoulder. "It was one hell of a draining first rescue, and a weird night, besides… so maybe I'm not processing things very well… but I need to know that you're alright, John. Seriously, _is everything okay?"_

John was not a hugger. Such displays weren't much in his physical vocabulary, and never had been. But he _could_ choose not to pull away from Scott's warm hand. Using an astronomer's averted gaze, arms folded across his chest, he said,

"Sure. I'm fine, now. Just, um… sort of hungry. Thanks."

Scott relaxed. Patted his brother's back, even. His physical armory was nearly as barren as John's, but a lot of the unsaid stuff got through, anyhow.

"Understood. We'll drop it, then… but please take better care in the future. If nothing else, NASA probably prefers their astronaut candidates to be a little less accident-prone."

John surprised him with an actual smile and pretty-near chuckle.

"Yeah. They're funny like that. I'll invest in a rabbit's foot and draw big 7s in the waistband of all my underwear, promise."

Scott's answering grin was tired, but genuine.

"Better than that. I'll let you borrow my lucky air-strike socks, for the interview."

"Long as you wash them, first."

He'd probably end up wearing them, too; needing all the good fortune he could muster to make the cut with NASA. But that would come later. Now, there was a meeting to attend; in the warm sunlight of an untroubled world, with his father, brothers and friend.

Once again, Scott put a hand on his shoulder, and once more, John left it there, very glad to be home.


End file.
